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Organic Food Is Better For Us -- So Why Don't We All Eat It?

Peter Melchett writes in The Guardian (on-line) that the scientific evidence for organic food's healthier claims is clear and persuasive. (Melchett is "policy director of the Soil Association, a UK organic food and farming organisation.") But will that sway governments to encourage organic over their preferred GMO or pesticide-based ag systems? Probably not. It's a commentary on the relationship between macro-political influence and agricultural habits. More closely it's a commentary on food and politics, and science and politics, and science and food. But to say it's just "politics…

Google Polarizes America?

The techno wonder pundits say that the internet revolutionizes democracy by leveling the playing field (everyone can be an ass online, oh yeah!) But what I find more fascinating about the internet and politics is the role that search plays in polarizing politics. I mean, sure there are dissenting voices all over the internet, but google "John McCain" or "Obama" or "Sarah Palin" or "Joe Biden" and you won't discover a single dissenting opinion about any of these candidates on the front page of the search results (the exceptions to this rule are probably the small news items that Google…

Re-Imagining the Future of University Research Magazines

Next week the Howard Hughes Medical Institute will be hosting the annual conference of the University Research Magazine Association (URMA). The association is comprised of editors and staffers at magazines that cover the research and scholarly activities of universities, nonprofit research centers, and institutes in the U.S., U.K., Canada, and Europe. Depending on your field and professional background, you may or may not be familiar with publications such as Yale Medicine, UNC's Endeavors, the HHMI Bulletin, Florida State's Research in Review, and Arizona State's Research Stories and…

Neuroscience Boot Camp

Professor Martha J. Farah emailed me recently to ask if I'd help spread the word about Neuroscience Boot Camp, which will take place at the University of Pennsylvania in August of next year: What happens at Neuroscience Boot Camp? Through a combination of lectures, break-out groups, panel discussions and laboratory visits, participants will gain an understanding of the methods of neuroscience and key findings on the cognitive and social-emotional functions of the brain, lifespan development and disorders of brain function. Each lecture will be followed by extensive Q&A. Break-out…

Blood, guts & brains

The BBC has produced an interesting series called Blood and Guts about the modern history of surgery and the first episode, which is about neurosurgery, is now available online at the BBC iPlayer website. (For those outside the U.K., it is also available as a torrent.) Presented by surgeon Michael Mosley, the program begins with the pioneering work of Harvey Cushing, then continues with a discussion of Phineas Gage, the Yale physiologist Jose Delgado and the lobotomist Walter Freeman. Mosley also meets Howard Dully, who was lobotomized at the age of 12 by Freeman. In one particularly…

The NY Times Makes the Agenda Pitch on Global Warming

Back in February, I described how the first release of the IPCC was a massive communication failure, never really landing on the wider media or public agenda. In a column at Skeptical Inquirer Online, I described alternative strategies for reaching Americans. As the next IPCC release arrives on Friday, the New York Times has marshaled its journalistic resources in its best attempt to make sure that global warming places third behind the war and the 2008 horse race in terms of media and public attention. For the second time in three days, the Times leads with news about the issue. On…

America's Religious Landscape

The Week in Review section of the New York Times had a piece on evangelicals in this country in which it details the tension between tradiationalist, centrists and modernists (available online here). The article appears to be prompted by the latest Pew Forum National Survey of Religion and Politcs. In brief, 26.3% of Americans are evangelicals who can be broken down into traditionalists (12.6%), centrists (10.8%) and modernists (2.9%). Predictably, the traditionalists are Republican (70%), oppose evolution (93%), believe in Armageddon (77%), support "traditional marriage" exclusively (89%),…

Women In High Tech: Catalyst Survey

Are you a women in a high tech job? Please consider participating in this worthwhile project; it only takes a few minutes. Lisa Gable recently wrote to the WEPAN listserve: I am writing to share news about exciting research being conducted by Catalyst, which IBM is sponsoring, in part. Catalyst is the leading research and advisory organization working with businesses and the professions to build inclusive environments and expand opportunities for women at work. This study focuses on talent management and women in high tech jobs and/or companies. The research provides insight into women's…

Other adaptive landscape papers

Having blown my own trumpet, I should mention that there are a few other articles in the same edition of Biology and Philosophy (which I hadn't seen until now) on Gavrilets' view of adaptive landscapes now on Online First: Massimo Pigliucci has a very nice historical summary of Sewall Wright's initial metaphor and ideas and how they changed (it hadn't occurred to me, but should have, that the landscape metaphor fails to deal with new mutations, which change the landscape itself (although I did say something like this in my 1998 paper). Anya Plutinski discusses the iconography of Wright's…

We're Being Studied!

How's that for role reversal on Science Blogs? Well, leave it to the good folks at Carnegie Mellon... Scientists have long studied how information, influence or physical items move through networks. But by combining that field of research with how to optimally detect the flow in a cost-effective way, the Carnegie Mellon researchers have devised a formula, or algorithm, that could lead to dramatically improved sensor networks, whether geared toward political blogs or posture. But how would this cascade be modeled? What sensors, or blogs in this case, should be tapped to maximize the…

Casual Fridays: How many browser tabs do you use?

A few days ago after downloading the latest beta version of the FireFox web browser, I posted what I thought was an innocuous complaint on Twitter: The software assumes you will always have multiple web pages open. Even if you're only reading one web page, the browser puts it in a tab, thus taking up valuable screen real estate. Immediately I started getting replies: "how can you work with just one tab? I've got 37 open now!" "Does anyone not use tabs anymore?" Actually, it's not that I never use tabs, it's that sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. But perhaps I'm the only one. But still, it…

ScienceOnline09: Blogging allies

Both ScienceWoman and I are attending ScienceOnline09 in January; ScienceWoman has already gotten your feedback about her session she's co-chairing with KH, so it is high time for me to ask your thoughts about the session I'm co-chairing with Abel Pharmboy and Zuska. Our session is titled "Gender in science" but we're really interested in how blogging and online interactions can provide allies with a way to support women bloggers, bloggers who are people of colour, LGBT bloggers, and other underrepresented bloggers in STEM. So, as examples, in no particular order (but numbered in case you…

Evolution/design: if a conversation starts in the blogosphere and no one joins it, does it make a sound?

Something I ran across by accident, while perusing our latest copy of Issues in Science and Technology: currently, the National Academies are sponsoring a Visual Culture and Evolution Online Symposium. It runs through Wednesday. What that means, apparently, is their panelists discuss the intersection of design, art, and culture with evolutionary biology concepts (sexual selection, genetics, adaptation, etc.) at a blog set up for the purpose. The blog is basic (generic template), and a bit confusing. What seems to be happening is that panelists' ongoing contributions are folded into the posts…

Industry practices bias

Shocking: The study, published by the Public Library of Science online journal PLoS Medicine, echoes other findings that show industry-funded research on drugs is more likely to be favorable to the drugs than independent research. Ludwig's team reviewed 111 studies on soft drinks, juice and milk that were published between 1999 and 2003. "We chose beverages because they represent an area of nutrition that's very controversial, that's relevant to children, and involves a part of the food industry that is highly profitable and where research findings could have direct financial implications,"…

Life imitates the Castle

The Sydney Morning Herald reports The High Court Computer games enthusiasts are free to modify their Playstations to run cheap games bought overseas or online, following a landmark High Court ruling. The court found that "mod-chips"- used to override technology that prevents consoles running games not purchased in Australia - are legal. The decision follows a four-year battle between Eddy Stevens, a Sydney mod-chip supplier based in a backyard at Kensington, and the electronics giant Sony, which claimed the chips were overriding its copyright protection technology. Kim Weatherall has the…

China Choking on their own growth.

I'm traveling right now but wanted to post a link to NYTimes' "Choking on Growth" series. It's well worth a read (it's not the best written article I've seen - it repeats itself a lot, but the facts make a good story). The author of "The River Runs Black: The Environmental Challenge to China's Future" will be online chatting today on the NYTimes' site. Three facinating stats before I go: In 2005 alone, China added 66 gigawatts of electricity to its power grid, about as much power as Britain generates in a year. Last year, it added an additional 102 gigawatts, as much as France. and Only 1…

Science Online 2010 ...

... SciTen is coming ... In preparation for Science Online 2010 Session C, Trust and Critical Thinking organized by Stephanie Zvan and including PZ Myers, Desiree Schell, Greg Laden, and Kirsten Sanford, I'll be posting a few items such as Are You A Real Sketpic? over the next few days. Most readers of this blog will not be going to this mid-January conference, but that does not mean you can't participate. There will probably be the ability to participate in the actual events via twitter or other social networking media. However, it is also possible to be involved by posting comments on…

Why we fight for patients

Never let it be said that Orac can't match Mark Crislip in shameless promotion. The world might indeed need more Mark Crislip™, but I like to think that it needs a bit more of his friends, too. So, in that spirit, here are the videos, recently released by the James Randi Educational Foundation, of Bob Blaskiewicz, myself, and some key SBM players that you've come to know and love. The first video is a talk by my best "friend" in the world at The Amazing Meeting in July about Stanislaw Burzynski, MD, PhD. It's entitled Why We Fight (Part I): Stanislaw Burzynski Versus Science-Based Medicine.…

Best Science Show

This weeks ask the Scienceblogger question is: What's the best science show ever? I'll go with David Attenborough's Life on Earth. I probably would have become a biologist without Attenborough's example, but who can be sure. I watched our tapes of that show until they wore out. I wanted to be David Attenborough until I realized that wasn't really a career description. The cinematography of all of his work is just astounding, and the man can explain biological diversity with the sort of personable passion that you just don't get often enough. The show is available in pirated BitTorrent…

Chesterton, Madness, Reason

Adam Gopnik has a great New Yorker article (not online) on the genius and wickedness of G.K. Chesterton. Although he wrote some masterful books - my favorites are The Man Who Was Thursday and the Father Brown detective stories - Chesterton was also a consistent antisemitic, prone to tedious defenses of Catholic orthodoxy. To be honest, though, my favorite thing about Chesterton are his aphorisms: only Wilde is more quotable. Gopnik has found some great ones ("The function of the imagination is not to make strange things settled, but to make settled things strange") but he left out a few of…

Justice for Chad Cook: What Took MSHA So Long??

What does it take for MSHA's Richard Stickler and the Solicitor of Labor to do their jobs? Front-page newspaper stories about MSHA's failures? A letter from a grieving mother? A petition signed by other family-member victims of workplace fatalities? Apparently, it took all this and more for MSHA finally to decide that the November 8, 2005 coal truck accident at the Alliance Resources' Metikki Mine which killed Chad Cook, 25, was work-related.  Chad Cook, a contract driver employed by the Utah-based Savage Services, died when his haulage truck, heavy-loaded with coal, ran off…

Science journalism: don't forget the editors

Continuing the current discussion of the questionable quality of popular science journalism, British researcher Simon Baron-Cohen weighs in at the New Scientist with his personal experiences of misrepresented research. Baron-Cohen complains that earlier this year, several articles on his work linking prenatal testosterone levels to autistic traits, including coverage in the Guardian, were titled and subtitled misleadingly: It has left me wondering: who are the headline writers? Articles and columns in newspapers are bylined so there is some accountability when they get things wrong. In this…

Trolling the antivaccine trolls

There are many ways to combat antivaccine pseudoscience. Personally, I've chosen my favored methods, namely blogging, giving talks, and generally combatting pseudoscience on social media wherever I find it. That's not all I do (for example, I do have a couple of papers in the peer-reviewed medical literature designed to combat the infiltration of pseudoscience into academia), but it is where I put most of my effort. For one thing, I'm good at it. For another thing, it's fun. Also, it's something I can work into my busy schedule more easily. It even brings me a bit of notoriety now and then,…

A smorgasbord....

Being quite busy lately, I accumulated a lot of links to stuff I wanted to comment on but never found time. Well, it does not appear I will find time any time soon, so here are the links for you to comment on anyway (just because I link to them does not mean I agree with them - in some cases quite the opposite): In Defense of Secrecy : Given the pervasive secrecy of the Bush-Cheney administration, and the sorry consequences of that disposition, President Barack Obama's early emphasis on openness in government seems almost inevitable. One of the first official communications issued by the new…

Talkin' Trash

I know everyone in the sci-blogosphere is swooning over Carl Sagan. But as a kid I never cared much about him - I usually fell asleep halfway through each episode of 'Cosmos'. But I would not miss for anything an episode of 'The Underwater Odyssey of Commander Cousteau' with Jacques-Yves Cousteau. That was breathtaking. And what he and the crew of Calypso did was truly ground-breaking, both in terms of scientific discoveries and in terms of under-water filming. And those discoveries and breakthroughs were shared with us, the audience, in an intimate and immediate manner. That was a long time…

Research Triangle Park

My regular readers probably remember that I blogged from the XXVI International Association of Science Parks World Conference on Science & Technology Parks in Raleigh, back in June of this year. I spent the day today at the headquarters of the Research Triangle Park, participating in a workshop about the new directions that the park will make in the future. It is too early to blog about the results of this session, though the process will be open, but I thought this would be a good time to re-post what I wrote from the June conference and my ideas about the future of science-technology…

New work on speciation

Just lately there's been a flurry of papers on speciation that I haven't had time to digest properly. Several of them seem to support "sympatric" or localised speciation based on selection for local resources with reproductive isolation a side effect of divergent selection. So here they are below the fold with abstracts and my comments... Evolution of reproductive isolation in plants Heredity advance online publication 23 July 2008; doi: 10.1038/hdy.2008.69 A Widmer, C Lexer and S Cozzolino Reproductive isolation is essential for the process of speciation and much has been learned in…

Food vendors: Taking the gloves off

Stories like this really interest me, so a special thanks to Jody Lanard who sent it along. It's about those gloves they wear while making you a sandwich at the deli or a fast food joint. You know the ones. The disposable plastic kind. Disposable so you can change them often and throw them away. The kind that prevent the hands of the person behind the counter making direct contact with the food. Those gloves. From the Journal of Food Protection Volume 68, Number 1 p. 187-190, a paper by Lynch et al.: A study was conducted to determine whether the levels of selected microorganisms differed on…

Our Budget Boondoggle

Perusing the Congressional Budge Office website, I came across some fascinating numbers from the Federal budget. For instance, where does Federal revenue primarily come from? Let's look at the historical budget numbers. In 2003, personal income taxes provided 44.5% of all revenues; in 2000 it was 49.6%. Corporate income taxes provided 7.4% of all revenues; in 2000 it was 10.2%. But in that time, total Federal revenues have dropped from 2 trillion dollars to 1.78 trillion dollars, while federal spending has gone from 1.79 trillion to 2.16 trillion - almost an exact reversal. The result? In…

Dichloroacetate and The DCA Site: A low bar for "success"

It's been a couple of weeks since we last checked in with The DCA Site, that dubious advertising site for BuyDCA.com, where a chemist named Jim Tassano sells to desperate cancer patients non-pharmaceutical grade and non-FDA-approved dichloroacetate, the small molecule chemotherapeutic agent with an interesting and unusual mechanism of action that has shown promise in rat models of cancer but as yet has not undergone clinical trials in humans to determine if it is effective in cancer. Based on a lot of hype by the credulous and proudly ignorant, a lot of distrust of big pharma (some justified…

Birds in the News 159

tags: Birds in the News, BirdNews, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter Black-throated Sparrow, Amphispiza bilineata, in Chaco Canyon. Image: Dave Rintoul, June 2008 [larger view]. Birds in Science This is a link to a fascinating slide show that documents 9 links in the dinosaur-to-bird transition -- plenty of strong evidence that birds evolved from dinosaurs! GrrlScientist comment: "link" number four is very dubious, though, and I am surprised they even used it in their story. People Hurting Birds Both engines of the US Airways flight that crash-landed in the Hudson River last month…

At Home with the Numbers Game.. or John Michael Greer is Singing my Song!

As you know, Greer and I at times have our differences in perspective, but I think this week's column is particularly acute, and offers up two point that I think are really essential to grasp when thinking of the future. The first is that technical feasibility is not all - that technical feasibility rests on a complex bed of other feasibilities. Thus, simply observing that it is technically possible, to, say, create zero impact cities or whatever does not usefully tell us whether we are going to do it. For example, it has been technically possible to eliminate most causes of death in…

Mommy, I want a saber-toothed kitten!

In 1990, the late Michael Crichton published his most influential book. Sure, a lot of us loved 'State of Fear', but let's be honest - that's not his most popular book. If you haven't been under a rock through the '90s, you've probably heard of it - Jurassic Park. Of course, the series' portrayal of dinosaurs may have been a bit off (we now know the velociraptors had feathers, for example), but the idea was pure brilliance. Resurrecting animals from blood stored in preserved mosquitos - genius, and eventually, maybe even possible. This, the week of his death, scientists have published a few…

Making popcorn for the coming tardigrade wars

This could get interesting. I've seen a lot of stories about this recent paper on the tardigrade genome: Horizontal gene transfer (HGT), or the transfer of genes between species, has been recognized recently as more pervasive than previously suspected. Here, we report evidence for an unprecedented degree of HGT into an animal genome, based on a draft genome of a tardigrade, Hypsibius dujardini. Tardigrades are microscopic eight-legged animals that are famous for their ability to survive extreme conditions. Genome sequencing, direct confirmation of physical linkage, and phylogenetic analysis…

Geekiness of Years Past -or- What the hell is AYBABTU?

I was having a conversation with someone the other day, and I mentioned the phrase All Your Base Are Belong to Us (AYBABTU) and just got a really blank stare. This is a shame because not only is it a funny line, but it is an absolutely critical part of recent geek history. So I thought I would share it with you -- you meaning those of you who were not already aware of it. The phrase All Your Base Are Belong to Us originates from a video game called Zero Wing that was translated poorly from Japanese to English upon its release here (apparently in Japanese it made a lot more sense). Here is…

Hippies might have something going with that incense crap

Actually, I'll let you read the press release first and then we'll decide if 'religious leaders' and the damn hippies know something we don't ;) Religious leaders have contended for millennia that burning incense is good for the soul. Now, biologists have learned that it is good for our brains too. In a new study appearing online in The FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org), an international team of scientists, including researchers from Johns Hopkins University and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, describe how burning frankincense (resin from the Boswellia plant) activates poorly…

Active Engagement Works: "Improved Learning in a Large-Enrollment Physics Class"

Physics is a notoriously difficult and unpopular subject, which is probably why there is a large and active Physics Education Research community within physics departments in the US. This normally generates a lot of material in the Physical Review Special Topics journal, but last week, a PER paper appeared in Science, which is unusual enough to deserve the ResearchBlogging treatment. OK, what's this paper about? Well, with the exceptional originality that physicists bring to all things, the title pretty much says it all. They demonstrated that a different style of teaching applied to a large…

Cheap personal genomics: the death-knell for the industry?

Yesterday I discussed the decision of personal genomics company 23andMe to slash its price for a genome scan by 60%, to under $400. In the comments to that post, industry observer David Hamilton pointed me to an article he's written for BNET on the implications of 23andMe's price plunge, which (like everything he writes) is well worth a read. Hamilton has long argued, quite compellingly, that the true business model of personal genomics companies relies only indirectly on selling genome scans to consumers: ...personal-genomics companies don't intend to make money by selling the tests.…

Finally, the FDA acts on TheDCASite.com

It sure took the FDA long enough, nearly five months, but it finally acted. It finally shut Jim Tassano down, as this notice on TheDCASite.com states: Two agents from the FDA visited us on Tuesday,July 17, 2007 and ordered that we stop making and selling DCA. Unfortunately, the site www.buydca.com will be shut down immediately. It is against US government law to sell substances with the suggestion that they are cancer treatments unless they are approved by the FDA. DCA can still be obtained from pharmacies with a prescription and from chemical companies. To keep you informed and abreast of…

Rabble.ca article repost: Question! What is really happening at the DFO libraries?

A couple of weeks ago I was approached by Rabble.ca to write a piece for them with some of my thoughts about the current controversy surrounding the government of Canada's closure of several Department of Fisheries and Oceans libraries. I have a link compilation here. I was happy to write up something and it appeared here. Rabble also allows authors to keep all rights to their work so we agreed that after a few days I would be able to repost it here on my blog. Which is what I've done below. I will reiterate my thanks to Kaitlin McNabb for offering me this opportunity and for her very…

A sad day for public science advocacy

I've been at this blogging thing for more than a decade now. Looking back on those years, I find it incredible that I've lasted this long. For one thing, I still marvel that there are apparently thousands of people out there who still like to read my nearly daily musings (or, as George Carlin would call them, brain droppings) after all these years. More importantly, being a public advocate for science is a rough business, as I've documented over the years. Back when I first started out, I was completely pseudonymous and anonymous. I kept my real name relatively secret. It was less than five…

Science & Technology Parks - what next?

As you may have noticed if you saw this or you follow me on Twitter/FriendFeed/Facebook, I spent half of Tuesday and all of Wednesday at the XXVI International Association of Science Parks World Conference on Science & Technology Parks in Raleigh. The meeting was actually longer (starting on Sunday and ending today), but I was part of a team and we divided up our online coverage the best we could do. Christopher Perrien assembled a team (including his son) to present (and represent) Science In The Triangle, the new local initiative. They manned a booth at which they not only showcased…

The Evolution of Asshatitude on The Internet

Matini chewed hungrily on the cooked forearm of the monkey as I watched, thinking, "WTF, is he really not going to share?" The others watched him with looks of incredulity that told me they were thinking the same thing. Finally, Latala said to Matini, thumb pointing sideways to me, "You know, he knows the rules." "Huh?" Matini replied, looking up vaguely with his eyes while chewing the arm. "You killed that monkey with an arrow he had given you. Therefore, that arm is his, according to our traditional way of dividing up the portions of animals we have hunted. But you are not sharing."…

The "pharma shill" gambit

Over the last couple of days, I've been discussing How "They" See "Us," which is basically that "they" see "us" as pure evil. Well, maybe not always sheer evil, but certainly not good, and even more certainly as having ulterior motives, the most common of which is filthy pharma lucre. So it seemed appropriate, as a grant deadline fast approaches and constrains my time, to revisit a topic that comes up here from time to time. Basically, every so often, my day job intrudes on my blogging hobby, preventing the creation of fresh Insolence, at least Insolence of the quality that you've come to…

Swine flu: more on the genetics of the virus

A reader (hat tip, sandy) has pointed me to a very interesting interview with CDC's chief virologist, Ruben Donis, in Science Magazine's blog, ScienceInsider. In it he provides further information on the confusing reports about the species origin of the current swine flu, originally said to be of swine, human and bird origin but later claimed to be only swine. It may be that both are true, depending on how you look at it. According to Donis, who has been sequencing the isolates, the virus is all recent swine but bears the marks of human and avian ancestry in some genes. Different genes have…

NYT Takes the Wrong Angle on Senate Climate Debate

For the first time since 2005, the full Senate chamber is debating climate legislation: the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act, or CSA. Although the chances of this legislation becoming law this year are slim, it could lay important groundwork for the next Congress and Administration. If you want to know the key details about what the CSA proposes and what the remaining sticking points are, go read this excellent Gristmill post by Kate Sheppard â and donât seek your information from todayâs New York Times. As the title suggests, John M. Broderâs NYT article âSenate Opens Debate on…

DIY biology: incubating in Seattle

This afternoon, I attended the first meeting of a DIY biology group in Seattle, after a kind invitation from one of the founders.   DIY, for those of you new to the acronym, stands for "Do It Yourself."   But, you say, there are lots of people who do biology on their own. Some people keep pets. Some have children. Others raise tropical fish, go bird watching, or mushroom hunting. Some people even make yogurt or cheese, or brew beer, or make wine. What makes DIY biology so different?   This isn't your grandfather's home brew Well, lets say for now that it's a little more technical…

Top Songs of 2007

Here are the 22 five-star-rated songs that I added to my iTunes library in 2007 (aphabetcal by artist): "Rehab," Amy Winehouse "Antichrist Television Blues," Arcade Fire "Open All Night," Bruce Springsteen & The Sessions Band "Bottom of the Rain," Buffalo Tom "CC and Callas," Buffalo Tom "Sly," The Cat Empire "Gimme Some Motivation," Delta Spirit "Gasoline Drawers," The Holmes Brothers "Ruby," Kaiser Chiefs "Sugar Buzz," Li'l Cap'n Travis "Dashboard," Modest Mouse "The Road I Must Travel," The Nightwatchman "Lost to the Lonesome," Pela "Mr. Stupid," Richard Thompson "The Angels Hung…

Happy Open Access Day!

I'm tired of being prevented from reading academic papers because of subscription walls. Both as a student and someone who loves to dig into the history of science, I often cast a wide net when I'm searching for information on a topic I want to know more about. At this very moment, for instance, I'm taking a break from writing a chapter of my book about birds and dinosaurs. In doing research for the chapter, I have come across a number of references that have been hard to come by, one of which is Alick Walker's 1972 Nature paper "New light on the Origin of Birds and Crocodiles." Rutgers,…

Mommy Monday: Minnow's ideal day

Minnow woke up yesterday morning snuggled in my arms. We rolled over and nudged Fish awake as Minnow happily wiggled between her parents. After a few minutes, she decided she wanted a little something to eat, so I obliged. When she was finished, she rolled away from me and let out a sigh of pure satisfaction. I looked down at her and she had a huge smile on - I swear it was the sort of smile one has when they've just had really good sex. She just seemed blissful. Minnow's good mood got me thinking about what a perfect day would look like in her eyes. It's hard to know for sure because her…