laelaps | January 29, 2008Given that so many of us are picking up Stephen Jay Gould's The Structure of Evolutionary Theory, I thought I would post an interview he gave on the Charlie Rose Show about his book Full House. (The sound and video become a bit disconnected during the video, unfortunately);
Most of what is said will be familiar for those of you who've read Full House, a book that (to tell the truth) I was a bit disappointed with. I liked the discussion about understanding evolution as the expanding or contracting of variation and complexity over time, but the section involving baseball went on for too…
laelaps | January 29, 2008[Note: For fuller and more technical summaries of the Anthropocene and why it just doesn't fit (at least not yet), please read Chris' and Greg's posts. Likewise, naming new periods of time for perceived changes in our species or our impact in the world isn't anything new, i.e. the older concept of the noosphere (which I will write more about soon)]
Every few years it seems that the concept of the "Anthropocene" rears its ugly head again, the general idea being that we are now in a new geologic epoch defined by changes that our species has inflicted on the earth. The term is essentially tied…
laelaps | January 29, 2008
It seems that we have something of a book club starting up here on Sb. Razib has started to blog his way through Stephen Jay Gould's "magnum opus" The Structure of Evolutionary Theory, and it looks like John is going to join in, too. I purchased the book after seeing at the AMNH about two years ago, but I didn't get very far (my eyes started to go cross around page 90). Given that I've learned a bit more about evolution and the arguments that still surround Gould & his writings since that time, I'm probably in a better place to pick the book up again.
The project will be made all the…
laelaps | January 29, 2008
Gobiconodon ostromi was a triconodont mammal found in both North America and Asia during the early Cretaceous. It was rather large for an early Cretaceous mammal, the skull being about 10 cm long.
laelaps | January 28, 2008
I can only imagine how many people are going to banging on this machine in futility with cries of "Don't hold out on me, man!"
laelaps | January 28, 2008
The skeleton of an Irish Elk (Megaloceros giganteus) at the AMNH.
Discussions of mass extinctions nearly always give rise to heated debates as to the mechanism(s) behind the disappearance of so many taxa in a short amount of time, and one of the most active debates still surrounds the extinction of Pleistocene megafauna. All over the world the extinction of large animals appears to be correlated with the movements of our own species, Homo sapiens, into new territories. Disease and climate change have their own parts to play, the "Overkill Hypothesis" is perhaps the most popular explanation…
laelaps | January 28, 2008Yes... and no. Shelley isn't going to be keeping up with Retrospectacle anymore, nor is Steve going to keep blogging away at Omni Brain, but the two of them are going to team-up to bring us a new super blog! There's just one problem; they need a name. If you've got some ideas head to either of the links I just provided and post your idea in the comments. Whoever comes up with the chosen moniker will get a bunch of cool swag in addition to the love and adulation of Shelley & Steve.
laelaps | January 28, 2008
It may not be perfectly framed, but I still love the intensity of the stare of the Amur leopard (Panthera pardus orientalis) in this photo. In the wild this subspecies of leopard exists essentially as a remnant population, only about 40 being left in the wild. Conservation efforts to shore up those numbers are a bit stunted due to political concerns, the Amur leopard being less popular/charismatic than the Amur tiger, etc., and it seems very probable that this subspecies could be lost.
laelaps | January 27, 2008The New York Review of Books has a new article up about blogging, and although much of what Sarah Boxer says is familiar it seems that science blogs have a different sort of existence on the web than what's described in the piece. I'll keep my grumbling that the recently published Open Laboratory wasn't given a mention to a minimum, but one particular passage struck me as a bit odd;
Bloggers are golden when they're at the bottom of the heap, kicking up. Give them a salary, a book contract, or a press credential, though, and it just isn't the same. (And this includes, for the most part, the…
laelaps | January 27, 2008
An early reconstruction of Megalosaurus, as alluded to by William Buckland in the text below. (Image source)
Yesterday a 1st edition copy of Francis Buckland's Curiosities of Natural History (1857) appeared in my mailbox, and it has proven to be a most delightful book. If you can find this book I would highly suggest you take the time to read it; it is wonderfully written and entertaining (although, as would be expected, there are some inaccuracies here and there). Francis Buckland was the son of famed geologist William Buckland, and throughout the book Francis pays homage to his father in…
laelaps | January 27, 2008Will has the latest edition of The Boneyard up at The Dragon's Tales. Check out some of the best paleo-posts from the last two weeks and keep your eyes open for new ones; the carnival will be over at Greg's place on February 9th.
[As an aside, yesterday was also the birthday of Roy Chapman Andrews. Michael put up a concise little bio in honor of the occasion.]
laelaps | January 27, 2008
One of the three Amur tiger (Panthera tigris altaica) cubs born last year at the Philadelphia Zoo (photo taken in September).
laelaps | January 26, 2008Assimilation into ScienceBorg.com ScienceBlogs.com has been rather rapid as of late, and I'm very pleased to announced that Kevin Z of The Other 95% is now on board over at Deep Sea News. Hell, the new banner alone is worth a look (you might need to refresh the page once or twice to cycle it up), so head on over and say "Hi."
laelaps | January 26, 2008I'm still trying to figure out how to best divide up my term paper from last semester about the evolution of hunting behavior in primates and hominids, but one thing that I learned was that a number of living primates will eat meat or catch prey if given the opportunity to do so. Chimpanzees have taken meat-eating to a more organized level than every other living primate except our own species (although behaviors associated with hunting may be used in raids on desirable plant food resources), but baboons frequently take animal prey, too. The narration is a little over-the-top (as is the slow-…
laelaps | January 26, 2008
The ring-tailed lemur (Lemur catta) is the most well-known (or at least most recognizable) of the living lemurs, probably because it is diurnal species and spends a lot of time on the ground. Just because this species is relatively easy to study does not mean it's any less interesting, though. One of the things that I learned while at the Duke Lemur Center is that olfactory signals are extremely important to this species, and the lemur in the photograph is scent marking the chain-link fence with glands on its wrists. This species also has scent glands on the shoulders and genitals, and males…
laelaps | January 25, 2008
More below the fold...
I don't know how well the Nissin hypothesis stands up to new evidence, though...
laelaps | January 25, 2008It might be a bit tenuous to base a post on something I saw in a cheesy 80's monster movie (complete with a synthesizer- and drum machine-driven montage), but the film Monster Squad got me thinking about science education. In an early scene, two monster-obsessed young boys are called into the main office, their principal extolling the virtues of science over adolescent interest in fantastic creatures. The principal, of course, comes off as a nerd and the overall impression is that science is utterly boring. While creatures of myth and legend can be pretty interesting, nature provides an array…
laelaps | January 25, 2008On November 23rd, 1858, T.H. Huxley wrote one of the most famous letters in the history of science to Charles Darwin. While the letter is perhaps most widely known for Huxley's staunch support of On the Origin of Species by Natural Selection against the opposition both were sure would come out against the book (Huxley opining that "I am sharpening up my claws & beak in readiness."), the letter also contains another important quote. As much as Huxley was taken with Darwin's book, he did have some reservations about one aspect of Darwin's idea that came up over and over again;
The only…
laelaps | January 25, 2008My post on whether natura non facit saltum is an accurate depiction of evolution has turned into a hopeless monster, so while I try and rescue it why don't you check out the newest addition to the ScienceBlogs family, DrugMonkey?