Explorations and ideas at the intersection between Evolution and Ecology
[caption id="attachment_464" align="alignleft" width="272" caption="Darwin-Wedgewood Crest"] [/caption] ***This post was a brief write up of a Darwin Day presentation I gave at Duke Marine Lab in 2010.*** Barnacles held an immense fascination for Darwin.
***Just wanted to thank everyone for the support while my son was ill. It meant so much to me! It took 2 and half weeks, a transfer to a regional children's hospital and a surgical tube in his chest to drain nearly 80mL of fluid that compressed his lung, due to the infection.
I'm sitting here on a bed that constantly readjusts itself. It's terribly annoying and when I lay down on it there is a low rumbling of the motor that pushes air to my legs and sucks it from butt.
Below is a guest post from my colleague Dr. Michael S. Rosenberg (msr at asu dot edu) who is an associate professor at Arizona State University. I think he has an interesting perspective in this discussion that can contribute to broader questions of redefining academia.
The National Center for Science Education is a wonderful institution dedicated to fighting junk science from entering our Nation's schools and media.
As you know from my last post, I am staunch proponent of open access to scientific information, especially the variety that I paid for by virtue of taxation.
Ask many scientists what they believe separates the pursuit of scientific inquiry from most everything else and you'll get a wide range of open-ended, flowery, idealistic, and nearly altruistic, statements like "unlock the mysteries of the world", "the thrill of discovery", "making a meaningful contribution to society", or "improving people's lives".
One of the challenges of biodiversity conservation is evoking a sense of place and an urgency of action to people. When we can’t even agree on a definition of what biodiversity is, it makes it all the more difficult to tell the public they should give a damn.
[caption id="attachment_365" align="alignleft" width="240" caption="Jenolan Caves, Australia. CC licensed image courtesy of flickr user avlxyz."][/caption] While the deep-sea may be the final frontier for marine biologists, caves remain one of the most elusive frontiers on (or rather, under) the land.
[caption id="attachment_351" align="alignleft" width="234" caption="Phidippus princeps, a jumping spider. Click image to see them in motion! Image still by Thomas Shahan."][/caption] As we carve out our domains for home, business or farm among the landscape, we give little thought to our eco-engineering on the previous denizens we "annexed" the land from.
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