And yes, punctuation & grammar skillz, I has them 🙂 That apostrophe really is in the right place – read on to find out why. The tale of the panda’s thumb is well-known, & an excellent example of how the action of natural selection can result in jury-rigged solutions to problems: a result that works, […]
Continue readingTag: animal diversity
what about archaeopteryx?
As a distraction (or should that be ‘procrastination’?) from what’s currently filling up my diary (ie processing student enrolments), I’ve decided to look at another of those ‘science’ statements from the school documents I linked to in my last post. "What about the archeopteryx?" they ask. Well, what about it? This, from their webpage: The […]
Continue readingyou could probably sell anything with the right sales pitch
My post about zeolite & the supposedly ‘chemical-free’ nature of various dietary supplements containing the stuff led to some interesting comments, & generated a few ‘I wonder if…’ moments. After all, as Krebiozen said (in the comments thread to that post): With the right sales pitch you could probably persuade some people that eating feline […]
Continue readingold fossils on a spoil heap
It wasn’t all koala-spotting on our trip across the ditch (the Tasman Sea, for those readers not familiar with New Zild as it is spoken, lol). Apart from the glories of Melbourne (lovely old buildings, the stunning King Tut exhibition in Melbourne Museum, floral Doc Marten boots mmmmmm – & of course the restaurants of […]
Continue readingif pharyngeal slits turn into gills, why don’t humans have gills?
It seems that Intelligent Design advocates have challenged PZ Myers to answer ’10+1′ questions about evolutionary biology, while he’s on an upcoming visit to Glasgow. PZ’s published the list here. One in particular caught my eye, because it mentioned lungs (the subject of a recent post of my own), so I thought I’d have a […]
Continue readingthe sarcastic fringeheads
Wouldn’t that make a great name for a band? Rather to my surprise, I’ve discovered that ‘sarcastic fringeheads’ are actually…
Continue readingtalking about exaptations
During a lecture to our second-year evolutionary biology class I introduced the concept of exaptations: features that have evolved in one environmental context but which have been co-opted to fill a different role in a changed environment. This was in the context of swim bladders/lungs, which I’ll talk about in a minute, but right now […]
Continue readinganother lovely biological image
Grant & I have something of an ongoing friendly competition to come up with stunning & unusual biological images. Here,via PZ (as usual!) & The Node is my latest offering: It’s a confocal microscope image of a squid embryo. The reddish areas are neural tissue (mmmm, braaaainzz) & each of those fluorescent green speckles is a tuft […]
Continue readingwaiter, there’s a fish in my cucumber!
My sea cucumber, that is. I was going to write something full of snark about the current brouhaha around predictions that the world is going to end on May 21st. But Darcy has beaten me to it! So instead (from the Echinoblog, and via PZ) I offer you… [drumroll]… the sea cucumber with fish residing in its nether […]
Continue reading‘darwin’s dilemma’ – id in nz
A little while ago Ken alerted me to an Intelligent Design website that appeared to be set up to provide ID ‘resources’ to teachers & others who might be interested. Today I found time to wander over & have a look at what was on offer (not much, at the moment). The site’s owner is […]
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