Books
laelaps | December 4, 2009Much of my forthcoming book is steeped in insights about evolution that have been derived from the new paleobiological synthesis, and in doing a bit a background reading I came across an interesting tidbit.
In 1980 numerous authorities on evolutionary science converged in Chicago for a conference on macroevolution. Spurred by the work of paleontologists such as Niles Eldredge, Stephen Jay Gould, David Raup, and Steven Stanley, the meeting's goal was to assess whether the traditional slow-and-steady model of evolution preferred by geneticists fit what paleontologists saw in the fossil record.…
sciencewoman | December 4, 2009Gosh it's a difficult time of year, when the desire to frolic outdoors in the late fall/early winter chill is tempered by the mountains of papers to grade, endless meetings to be held, and the lurking danger of syllabi for next semester. It's the time of year, when you have every intention of taking dog and kid for a walk after work, but that by the time you reach daycare, it is pitch black, and even though you haven't gotten there any later than you did a few months ago, you feel terrible about leaving your kid in the care of strangers so late into the night.
Minnow and I have been trying to…
sastyk | December 3, 2009I may be a happily married woman, but I'm not immune to seduction - who is? So when a lovely woman named Erin came around offering to fulfill my wildest fantasies, I was intrigued, if a little nervous. She promised me the moon, deep stimulation, plenty of aroused excitement, the full range of delights. It was intoxicating. And so I allowed my self to be swept away by the titillation of more and bigger and deeper. She was even open (shocking!) to getting my honey involved (more on this below). And thus, I find myself here at Science Blogs, ripe and panting to begin. The lure of more…
laelaps | December 3, 2009The December 2009 issue of the journal Evolution: Education and Outreach has just been released, and among the new offerings is a paper on "Print Reference Sources about Evolution" by Adam Goldstein. It seems to be a spinoff of Goldstein's paper on evolution blogs published in the same journal earlier this year, and it stresses the importance of print references during a time when online resources are becoming more widely available. While I agree that print references are still very important for anyone who wants to educate themselves about evolution, though, I don't think that Goldstein made…
pharyngula | December 2, 2009In what may be the only good use of Ray Comfort's version of the Origin, a copy is up for sale on ebay, with some added signatures. It's a fundraiser for Skepticon III, so if you're a collector of weird memorabilia, here's your chance.
laelaps | November 30, 2009
Eden, from The World Before the Deluge.
At least I know that, if I fail at everything else in life, I could write a book claiming to reconcile science and Christianity. People love them. No matter how many times the same old talking points are trotted out there always seems to be room for one more volume on the subject. And even if readers do not entirely agree with the content of such books many are still comforted by their existence. Among the "Things Christians Like" is to see scientists saying that hard evidence from nature supports Christian beliefs.
I do not say this to belittle the…
grrlscientist | November 29, 2009tags: Birdbooker Report, bird books, animal books, natural history books, ecology books
"How does one distinguish a truly civilized nation from an aggregation of
barbarians? That is easy. A civilized country produces much good bird
literature."
--Edgar Kincaid
The Birdbooker Report is a special weekly report of a wide variety of science, nature and behavior books that currently are, or soon will be available for purchase. This report is written by one of my Seattle birding pals and book collector, Ian "Birdbooker" Paulsen, and is edited by me and published here for your information and…
sb admin | November 27, 2009This week we are reading Judith Viorst's Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. This video was produced with a dedication to Kate, who explained to me why kids like this book so much even before they understand everything that's happening in it. She wisely told me that it's because kids rarely get to hear a story about a kid getting really mad, expressing their feelings, and without a neat fairy-tale or moralistic ending. Alexander just has a terrible, horrible, no good very bad day, and he's not afraid to tell us about it.
I'd also like to dedicate this post to all of…
sciencewoman | November 27, 2009This week we are reading Judith Viorst's Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. This video was produced with a dedication to Kate, who explained to me why kids like this book so much even before they understand everything that's happening in it. She wisely told me that it's because kids rarely get to hear a story about a kid getting really mad, expressing their feelings, and without a neat fairy-tale or moralistic ending. Alexander just has a terrible, horrible, no good very bad day, and he's not afraid to tell us about it.
I'd also like to dedicate this post to all of…
laelaps | November 25, 2009I'm pleased to announced that paleontologist Scott Sampson, author of the new book Dinosaur Odyssey and host of the children's tv show Dinosaur Train, has just launched a blog. It is called The Whirlpool of Life. Go check it out!
laelaps | November 24, 2009
Today is the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, and there is a whole list of things I am not going to do;
I am not going to set aside time to read On the Origin of Species when I get home.
I am not going to write a long ode to Darwin in which I pontificate on how his view of nature changed science and society.
I am not going to stop by any Darwin-themed parties, lectures, or other events.
And so on. I really do not have any special celebratory plans for today at all. Instead I intend to honor the work of Charles…
laelaps | November 23, 2009
I get a lot of questions about my forthcoming book, Written in Stone, but the most popular by far is "What are you going to say about creationism?"
Presently there is a glut of books that confront creationism in one way or another. There are books that counter creationist claims with scientific evidence (Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why it Matters, Why Evolution is True, The Greatest Show on Earth, &c.) and others that, while they present many of the same scientific arguments, are also concerned with making the idea of evolution less threatening to religious audiences (Only A…
pharyngula | November 22, 2009I have mixed feelings about this: a first-edition copy of Darwin's Origin of Species has been discovered, which is, of course, great — I do wish I had the pocket change to drop £60,000 to buy it for myself.
The weird part is that it was found in the guest bathroom of an old house in Oxford. Apparently, someone thought the Origin was perfect light, occasional reading for visitors attending to certain private physiological functions, which is nice, if a little trivializing. It's a bit odd, though, that they put the book there and no one seems to have bothered to notice it for 150 years. I am…
sb admin | November 20, 2009I am not in charge of SciWo's Storytime. Sure, it might look like I'm the one reading the books and operating the video camera, but Minnow exerts the ultimate executive authority as editor-in-chief. Some weeks no videos whatsoever are allowed to be made, some weeks she's content to let me pick the book, and some weeks she is quite happy to make a whole string of videos, so long as she chooses the content.
With that proviso, Minnow presents this week's edition of SciWo's Storytime featuring the book Little Squire the Fire Engine by Catherine Kenworthy and illustrated by Nina Barbaresi.
Now…
sciencewoman | November 20, 2009I am not in charge of SciWo's Storytime. Sure, it might look like I'm the one reading the books and operating the video camera, but Minnow exerts the ultimate executive authority as editor-in-chief. Some weeks no videos whatsoever are allowed to be made, some weeks she's content to let me pick the book, and some weeks she is quite happy to make a whole string of videos, so long as she chooses the content.
With that proviso, Minnow presents this week's edition of SciWo's Storytime featuring the book Little Squire the Fire Engine by Catherine Kenworthy and illustrated by Nina Barbaresi.
Now…
aardvarchaeology | November 16, 2009Dan Simmons published a wonderful, galaxy-spanning, mind-blowing sf novel in 1989: Hyperion. Then he followed it up with three more novels of which I have read two. They're OK, but not as good as the first book.
Science fiction is of course stories where fabulous things happen and are explained by science and technology rather than magic. There are two ways to do this: either you offer an explanation that is actually in line with what we know now and sort of makes sense, or you use technobabble to cover the fact that you, the writer, do not actually have any idea of how for instance space…
grrlscientist | November 15, 2009tags: Birdbooker Report, bird books, animal books, natural history books, ecology books
"How does one distinguish a truly civilized nation from an aggregation of
barbarians? That is easy. A civilized country produces much good bird
literature."
--Edgar Kincaid
The Birdbooker Report is a special weekly report of a wide variety of science, nature and behavior books that currently are, or soon will be available for purchase. This report is written by one of my Seattle birding pals and book collector, Ian "Birdbooker" Paulsen, and is edited by me and published here for your information and…
sciencewoman | November 13, 2009Three weeks ago, I had no idea who Knuffle Bunny was. Then one of our loyal readers and DonorsChoose philanthropists, requested the Mo Willems' book "Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus." Minnow seemed enthusiastic about the pigeon book, but when I opened up its Amazon page, she got really excited about another book by the same author.
One trip to the public library later, we came home with a book that we'd read 5 times before making it out of the library building. I think she must have read the book at her former daycare, but no matter where the source of her knowledge, Minnow was more than…
laelaps | November 10, 2009
A mammoth as restored in Gosse's Omphalos. In Gosse's view of history, however, such a scene never actually existed. The bones of the mammoth existed in the earth from the time of Creation and had never given form to a living animal.
Without a doubt, Philip Henry Gosse's Omphalos is one of the strangest books I have ever read. Published in 1857, two years before Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species would cause the public and academics alike to take evolution more seriously, Gosse's book was an attempt to rescue Creation itself from the perceived threat of science denuded of Christian…
terrasig | November 9, 2009Hella HeLa!
Skloot is PWned, as it were.
I learned late last night that author Rebecca Skloot was to be featured on the cover of this week's issue of Publishers Weekly. So, I clicked on the site this morning before the coffee was even done brewing and there is our wordsmithing hero.
I know that "The Making of a Bestseller 2010" is sure to make any author nervous but my reading of the manuscript tells me that the prediction is entirely consistent with the work.
Regular readers will know that we featured Ms Skloot here last week to brainstorm about her upcoming, self-supported book tour…