…and this is a 
Next Fall, I'll be back in the classroom teaching introductory biology again. One thing I'm planning to do is to use Shubin's Your Inner Fish for that course…and just look what the good man has done just for me: all the figures from the book have been released as powerpoint slides.
OK, he probably didn't think about me at all, and he's releasing them for everyone to use, but still…it's awfully serendipitous.
Grab 'em all, teachers! These are tools for getting more evolution into the biology classroom!
Education
Comments
Posted by: Moggie
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December 23, 2009 11:34 AM
It's a great book, and even the news that Shubin uses Powerpoint can't diminish my admiration of the man... much.
Posted by: Archaeopteryx
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December 23, 2009 11:35 AM
That's awesome, but where were these figures this semester when I was teaching Comparative Anatomy? Anyway, Shubin's book has made me a better teacher.
Posted by: Glen Davidson
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December 23, 2009 11:37 AM
The only good that cretinism/IDiocy ever did was to provoke some great scientific responses to their lies, like Shubin's book.
Eat your failure, IDiots.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/mxaa3p
Posted by: B166ER
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December 23, 2009 11:38 AM
Those are really cool slides. We need more young people being exposed to side by side examples of the kinds of changes that have happened over the many many years that life has been evolving on our little backwater planet. I wish I was in your class, P.Z., and not here in Everett WA. Living in a town that at one time(?) shot and lynched Wobblies fills me with shame and fear.
No Gods, No Masters
Cameron
Posted by: InfuriatedSciTeacher
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December 23, 2009 11:40 AM
Thanks for sharing that... I'll have to pass it along to the rest of my dept.
Posted by: lose_the_woo
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December 23, 2009 11:43 AM
Token snark:
So then why are there still fish?
Posted by: ChrisH
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December 23, 2009 11:44 AM
Re-reading it currently on my commute. Great book (as a non-biologist) that's well illustrated too. :-)
Posted by: Naked Bunny with a Whip
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December 23, 2009 11:49 AM
I can see through their skin! I'm totally trippin'!
Posted by: David23
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December 23, 2009 11:55 AM
Fantastic book, just finished The Greatest Show on Earth. I wonder which book I will get tomorrow on my birthday?
Posted by: Joffan
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December 23, 2009 12:05 PM
Releasing the inner creationist:
Posted by: DavidCT
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December 23, 2009 12:28 PM
Thanks for the heads up. Now where was the corcoduck? Sorry, with so many transitions think of all the new gaps. It is hard to keep up organizing the gaps so that they make sense.
Posted by: history punk
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December 23, 2009 12:50 PM
It's just microevolution.
Posted by: magista
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December 23, 2009 12:56 PM
Thanks for this. I've forwarded it to all our biology teachers. Here's hoping it makes its appearance next semester.
Posted by: MrFire
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December 23, 2009 1:05 PM
I still love the notion that my, say, 109-greats-grandparent was a single-celled microorganism, and that some of my distant, distant cousins still are.
Posted by: dpattersonmonroe
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December 23, 2009 1:09 PM
Thanks so much!! As a homeschooling parent teaching evolution, I'm always looking for cool resources to explain science to my kids. My 9 year old daughter took one look at the arm bones slide and pronounced it awesome, which of course is the response we want :-) Thanks!
Posted by: Jackal
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December 23, 2009 1:11 PM
Excellent! I leaned as much about biology from books like You're Inner Fish and Microcosm (highly recommended) as I did in my General Biology I and II courses this year.
Posted by: mikecbraun
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December 23, 2009 1:20 PM
Hey! I'm reading that book at this vey moment. Well, not this very moment...I'm typing at this very moment. But I will be reading it.....now!
Posted by: Katherine Lorraine, Chaton de la Mort
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December 23, 2009 1:24 PM
Wish I had a good biology teacher from my high school years - at the polar opposite to dpattersonmonroe, my family was Christian, so the theory of evolution was the big 'E' word. We didn't get a textbook, but we looked online and my mother approved of Christian-based ones, but disapproved evolution ones.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I failed human anatomy and have never held an interest in biology until recently, when it became encouraged by reading and studying about evolutionary theory - which I still only sort of understand.
Posted by: Zeno
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December 23, 2009 1:36 PM
You lucky dog. If only all of my single-celled cousins were nice and distant I wouldn't have to deal with them at Xmas.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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December 23, 2009 1:53 PM
I've tried teaching my inner fish but the damn thing won't listen.
Down boy! Down!
Posted by: Ronin
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December 23, 2009 2:11 PM
Total layman here, but I thought bony fish evolved after our ancestors left the ocean. Am I off-base?
Posted by: Glen Davidson
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December 23, 2009 2:32 PM
Is it really portraying the dog as ancestral to humans?
I hope not.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/mxaa3p
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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December 23, 2009 2:37 PM
Ronin: yes, you are. As a group, osteichthyans (bony fish) were around for at least a hundred million years before some of them became tetrapods.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawlw4oH0l6k2YD0NCQUeu7nC2owgujUl77U
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December 23, 2009 2:39 PM
Hmph. We're still fish...
I'd like to add my five stars to collective kudos for The Inner Fish. This non-scientist found it readable and educational.
No Creationist could read it, however; it would break their Jesus filters.
Posted by: sqlrob
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December 23, 2009 2:44 PM
GOAT ON FIRE!
Posted by: Rachel Bronwyn
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December 23, 2009 2:46 PM
What a fantastic resource. Now, when will someone do one on cetacean evolution? I'd hate to have to do the work myself.
Posted by: bastardsheep.com
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December 23, 2009 2:56 PM
I'm surprised you didn't say "get biology back in to the biology classroom ... especially in Texas".
Posted by: neon-elf.myopenid.com
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December 23, 2009 2:58 PM
I blame my inner fish for my bad knees.
Posted by: David Marjanović
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December 23, 2009 2:59 PM
Warning: Ichthyostega (third from the top) was not capable of putting the soles of its feet on the ground. (The palms of its hands, yes, but not the soles of its feet.) It wasn't able to twist its legs like that. It wasn't able to stand or walk; if it ever came to land, it moved the way seals do.
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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December 23, 2009 3:15 PM
Oh awesome. I loved this book, it was a great read.
Posted by: MaxH
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December 23, 2009 3:28 PM
Oh, I snapped those up something fierce.
I mean, I teach history, but you never know. I'll offer copies up to any faculty member that wants them, for sure.
Posted by: NewEnglandBob
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December 23, 2009 3:28 PM
Fantastic book. Terrific idea to release these to the public.
Posted by: theflyingtrilobite
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December 23, 2009 3:31 PM
I believe most of those illustrations (if not all) were created by the wonderfully-talented Kalliopi Monoyios.
Excellent stuff.
Posted by: Everyday Atheist
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December 23, 2009 3:35 PM
Sweet. May have to print these and "accidentally" leave them lying around in the room my Catholic mother-in-law is staying in.
Posted by: Richard Eis
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December 23, 2009 3:49 PM
Which is SO the point. Hehe
Loved the book.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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December 23, 2009 4:10 PM
Why would a Catholic have a problem with it.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawlw4oH0l6k2YD0NCQUeu7nC2owgujUl77U
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December 23, 2009 4:14 PM
David at 29:
It must have been a juvenile?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ichthyostega
Posted by: amphiox
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December 23, 2009 4:42 PM
re: #21
The simplified answer to your question is that there are two main groups of bony fish, the "ray-finned" fish, and the "lobe-finned" fish. All land vertebrates (tetrapods) are descended from the lobe fins, and the only surviving lobe-fins that are still "fish" are the lungfish and the coelacanths (though cladistically, all the tetrapods are still fish).
The ray-fins went on to take over the seas, and branched into several families. The vast majority of modern "bony" fish descend from one of those families, whose first appearance was after the tetrapod colonization of land.
Posted by: https://me.yahoo.com/a/3FrrNShoyftlirW._2Or7IFbr4z7e7hs.Wss#1287c
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December 23, 2009 5:00 PM
Merry Christmas!
"Ship and boat diverged; the cold, damp night breeze blew between; a screaming gull flew overhead; the two hulls wildly rolled; we gave three heavy-hearted cheers, and blindly plunged like fate into the lone Atlantic."
Posted by: Moggie
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December 23, 2009 6:26 PM
#16:
Ahem. You're In A Fish.
Posted by: Rutee, Shrieking Harpy of Dooooom
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December 23, 2009 9:01 PM
"Why would a Catholic have a problem with it."
well, if she disagrees with the orthodox ruling that, well, Science is right about the origin of life and all that fun stuff, then she'd have a problem with it.
Posted by: Moggie
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December 23, 2009 9:19 PM
Hey, Your Inner Fish is available in a Kindle edition! I've just gladly put more money into Prof. Shubin's pocket.
If there's anyone reading this who hasn't yet picked up the book: please do so. It's not just a fascinating look at our evolutionary history, it's also infused with the pleasure of finding things out. After reading it, you'll want to hug Neil Shubin.
Posted by: Rob Clack
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December 24, 2009 5:32 AM
Neil's book is terrific and I hate to make a negative remark, but the slide showing Eusthenopteron, Tiktaalik, Ichthyostega, etc, is wrong. The manus of Ichthyostega is unknown, so the reconstructed bones are in his imagination. Humerus, radius and ulna are known, but that's all.
Of course, Jenny knows this stuff better than I do. For the latest, you could email her. j.a.clack@zoo.cam.ac.uk.
Posted by: Multicellular
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December 24, 2009 10:15 AM
Awesome! Thanks so much for the link. I'll be teaching an intro to biology 2 class next semester, starting off with evolution, as well and these slides will be great!
Posted by: Vercetti
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December 27, 2009 10:21 PM
I'm a community college instructor in east texas (don't laugh at me). I made my zoology class read this book for a massive amount of points. Most students actually enjoyed it and a few began to see evolution and natural selection for the elegant process that it is. I did have one IDiot that needs to do more reading, i sent him in the direction of The Greatest Show on Earth. I'm adding both books to the optional extra credit book list for my non-science majors classes.
Posted by: Owlmirror
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December 27, 2009 11:46 PM
Actually, the manus in the figure looks greyer than the rest of the image, which I'm pretty sure is intended to indicate that it's speculative, not based on anything actually found.
I think he just wanted to emphasize that there was something there, even if it's a guess as to what it looked like.
I was just reading through her review paper --
Clack, J. A. 2009. The Fish–Tetrapod Transition: New Fossils and Interpretations. Evolution Education and Outreach, 2:213–223. doi 10.1007/s12052-009-0119-2
It might be nice if PDFs of her older papers were also available online for open-access download. Just a thought.