I assume the blogads track words in text–? I see that some promoting “creation science” are up right now–??? WHAT? Whatever this blog’s sympathy to matters spiritual we are firmly reality based and have no truck with creationism or “Intelligent Design”– I was educated as an evolution and populations biologist. To banish them, let us …
Urban Life
Reid Farmer’s browsing of the L.A. Times finds this report of a lost South American reptile at large in the suburbs. The animal is believed to be a spectacled caiman, estimated at 6 to 8 feet and possibly 200 pounds, which must be a big one if the caiman I knew from Panama are any …
Poison Frogs…
… are one of Annie Davidson’s passions, and cool evolution one of our Querencia’s favorite subjects. Here is alink to a story on two widely separated groups of these beautiful, deadly, and inoffensive creatures. It seems that not only do they extract their toxins from their food, in this case ants; two unrelated groups have …
Bookaholism 2
Reid sends this link from the LA times on in- house libraries. “For the bibliophile, what to do with the books is life’s central decorating issue, an ongoing discourse, a debate, and often an outright décor war, between aesthetics, the practicalities of storage and the consuming mindlessness of passion”. Some, who are not book lovers, …
No Steenking Penguins, But What’s Left?
…Matt, who is raising twin girls and trying not to screw that up, replies: “I’ve been thinking to bring my girls (they’re 4) to this flick [March]. It would be their first theater experience. But my folks, both regular film-goers and two of my most trusted movie critics, refused to recommend it even for kids. …
We don’t need no steenking penguins!!
..so Reid writes to Matt and me: “Have either of you seen ‘March of the Penguins’? It is a big hit here – projected to make more money than Michael Moore’s ‘Farenheit 9/11′ but as far as I can tell it is some magnificent footage of penguins with the most sentimental, lachrymose, maundering narrative with …
Prehistoric Contact Between Polynesia and California?
I want to thank Steve for extending the invitation to guest-blog here. I have been a great fan of his since reading Querencia in 1994. I make my living as a professional archaeologist and I was delighted to find we have common interests in that field upon discovering this blog last month. Our resulting fun …
More Evo– Guest Post
My friend Dr. John Burchard is a distinguished scientist, teacher, and researcher. His various interests include cichlid behavior, classical guitar, and falconry. He probably knows more about salukis and primitive sighthounds than anyone alive. He studied at Princeton, did postdoctoral work at the Max Planck Institute, worked under Konrad Lorenz,taught in Nigeria and worked for …
More Evo
Steve Sailer has another irresistible post up about selection, Darwin, ignorance, etc. that should offend everyone from creationists to “Gouldian” Marxists. Sample (he is talking of the necessity of taking all your antibiotics): “The good news is that there are no Creationists so dogmatic that they preach taking only two days worth of penicillin on …
Influences 2– Reply to Matt
Matt said: “You were a writer already into his own by the time I found that excerpt from “Rage” in the Smithsonian(?). But maybe you’d like to share some of your early unpublished work with us 🙂 and let us try to find the ghosts of Kipling and Hemingway in it? Maybe it’s not there …