languages

Written in Stone is now available for pre-sale on Amazon.com (as well as a few other online stores)! The description of the book, author bio, etc. will have to be updated, but otherwise it is good to see it get its own page, and many thanks to the several of you who have already pre-ordered copies.Yet another cool new paleo blog - Crurotarsi: The Forgotten Archosaurs. Looks like I am going to have to update my blogroll again.In the "online first" section of Evolution: Education and Outreach there is a new paper on science communication (which also covers the Darwinius kerfuffle) by Carl…
The area collectively known as Austronesia covers half the globe. It stretches from South-East Asia and Taiwan, across New Guinea and New Zealand, to the hundreds of small islands dotted around the Pacific. Today, it is home to about 400 million people. They are the descendants of early humans who spread throughout the Pacific in prehistoric times. These forebears are long dead but they left several unexpectedly important legacies that are evident in their modern descendants. The languages they used evolved and splintered into over 1,200 tongues spoken by modern Austronesians. The bacteria…