An important fossil discovery: Liaoconodon hui, a Mesozoic mammal with a transitional middle ear.

In the clip above, Jin Meng, curator of fossil mammals at the American Museum of Natural History, describes how the well-preserved fossil of Liaoconodon hui, a mammal that lived in the Mesozoic era -- the age of dinosaurs -- shows the development of middle ear structure that characterizes later mammals, including ourselves.

If Charles Darwin had a Facebook page...

...might it look like this?

The page was developed by Heather Snyder and Anna Heran, of the staff of the Lloyd Library and Museum, Cincinnati, in consultation with Nik Money, professor of biology at Miami University and a Lloyd board member. Just like a real Facebook page, it will be updated from time to time by the addition of new friends and comments.

Thanks to Anna Heran for posting the link, as well as a press release, on the Archives & Archivists listserv maintained by the Society of American Archivists, and to my wife for forwarding it to me.

Happy Darwin/Lincoln Day.

Today is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin. To mark the occasion, The New York Times has provided a video of a singing Darwin impersonator. The talented chap who does this is Richard Milner, a historian of science and Darwin specialist who was a boyhood buddy of the late Stephen Jay Gould. Today's Times has an excellent Op-Ed column on Darwin by Olivia Judson. (If you're not already registered for the Times on-line, you'll be asked to register before you can read the column. It takes only a minute, and it's free.)

Darwin was born on the same day as Abraham Lincoln: February 12, 1809.

Atonement

Yom Kippur ended at sundown yesterday. I'm not Jewish, but I like the idea of a "day of atonement" in which, among other things, you're supposed to make amends to anyone you've wronged in the previous twelve or thirteen (such are the vagaries of the Jewish calendar) months. So I'm trying some atonement here for things I've posted on this blog.

First, Ben Stein. I really came down hard on you. It's largely because I was so disposed to like you. I enjoyed your show, Win Ben Stein's Money. More to the point, we had a friend in common; someone whose judgment I respected and who once did one of the nicest things anyone has ever done for me. To see you trashing evolution came, to say the least, as an unexpected blow below the belt. Your falling for the canard that Darwin's theory gives support to Nazi racism and the Holocaust had me shaking my head in despair. Nevertheless, I'm willing to allow that, in this matter, you were acting the fool not the knave.

Next, Leon Kass. I made sport of your fuddy-duddy-uncle-ish objections to outdoor eating in general, and ice cream cones in particular. I disagree with you about embryonic stem cell research (I've never cottoned to slippery-slope arguments, so long as reasonable people like me get to decide where the lines get drawn) and some other issues for similar reasons. Nevertheless, I'll confess, I find you fascinating, because you seem to have something I don't (which, my having lived over sixty two years, may be evidence of naivete or even imbecility): what Miguel de Unamuno called the "tragic sense of life". It's something you seem to share with the British philosopher John Gray and my former Fray colleague and fellow blogger IOZ, not that either of them would necessarily want to be put in the same category with you, or with each other, or with Unamuno, for that matter.

Last (and certainly least), Sarah Palin. I was a bit snarky, but I'll give you credit for a couple of things you said during your Katie Couric interview: "Well, I am all for contraception", and "Oh, I think it [evolution] should be taught as an accepted principle." Good for you, though you still don't get my vote.

Your correspondent attempts metrical poetry.

A while back I acquired a copy of William Baer's Writing Metrical Poetry. After reading some introductory material, and learning about iambs (duh-DAH: think, "I WAN-dered LONE-ly AS a CLOUD"); trochees (DAH-duh: think, "ONCE up-ON a MID-night DREAR-y"); anapests (DAH-duh-duh: think, "THIS is the FOR-est pri-ME-val, the MUR-mur-ing PINES and the HEM-locks"; yes, that's a trochee at the end); and dactyls (duh-duh-DAH: think of where the Lone Ranger takes his garbage, "To the DUMP, to the DUMP..."), feet (iambs, etc.) to the line (scansion), rhyme schemes, slant rhymes, and so forth, I got to my first assignment. This was to write a four line poem, in "common measure", about a historical figure. Common measure is a rhythmic/rhyme scheme often used for hymns. A verse in common measure consists of two lines of iambic tetrameter (four iambs to the line) alternating with two lines of iambic trimeter (three to the line), with an abab rhyme scheme; for example:

A-MAZ-ing GRACE how SWEET the SOUND
That SAVED a WRETCH like ME,
I ONCE was LOST, but NOW am FOUND,
Was BLIND but NOW I SEE.

(If you want to give yourself a very bad earworm, realize that you can sing "Amazing Grace" to the tune of the theme song from Gilligan's Island, which is also in common measure.)

Anyway, while thinking of a name that would fit well into such a metric scheme, "Wilberforce" came to mind. Of course, this would be Bishop Samuel "Soapy Sam" Wilberforce, famous for his debate with Thomas Huxley over Darwin's theory of evolution. So, here's my poem:

THE BALLAD OF SOAPY SAM AND TART-TONGUED TOM

When Bishop Wilberforce denied
An ape could be his kin,
The clever Huxley then replied:
“I’d rather ape than him.”

In writing this, I violated several of Baer's instructions. For example: (1) the tone of the poem is humorous, not heroic; (2) I used two historical figures, not one; and (3) I used a slant rhyme ("kin/him"). I also played hob with history a bit: Wilberforce didn't squarely deny simian ancestry; he just asked Huxley on which side of his family tree his monkey forebears could be found. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoy it. Try singing it to the tune of "Amazing Grace".

8/13 Update: On the subject of evolution, there's a great column by Olivia Judson on the op-ed page of today's New York Times.

Ben Stein is a jackass.

And to think, I used to like the guy. Thanks to Archaeopteryx and Pharyngula for setting me straight.

Addendum: I don't agree with everything the commentator has to say on this clip. His response to Stein's silly assertion that "Darwinism" (i.e. natural selection) implies "social Darwinism" (i.e. the belief that altruism in social arrangements is counterproductive because it goes against the grain of "survival of the fittest"), and Stein's equally silly extension of that concept to include Nazi racism, is off target. In particular, the commentator's analogy between Nazi ideology and the notion of the covenant between God and the Jews is not only wrongheaded but offensive. He should instead have pointed out that evolutionary theory supports the notion that altruistic behavior can be beneficial not only for species but for individual survival.

Also, the commentator's apparent belief that economic globalization provides proof against war is wishful thinking. World War I is the most recent and perhaps strongest historical counterexample to the notion that extensive trading relationships between nations prevent them from going to war. Nevertheless, I think it is valid to say that, all other things being equal (which, admittedly, they seldom are), nations that trade with each other are less likely to fight each other than those that don't. In particular, I think that a nation like China that depends greatly on export markets is unlikely to risk military confrontations with its customers.

Update: Read about the dishonest content of Stein's movie Expelled, as well as the lengths to which its makers went to suppress intelligent criticism of it (ironic in light of their assertion that there is a scientific conspiracy to suppress criticism of evolution) here. (Again, a tip of the hat to Archaeopteryx.)

A missing link found.

This one, Cerasinops hodgskissi, is between American and Asian dinosaurs.

Right! The lizard-fish conversion. Very easy.

We have good clues about how fish evolved into land-dwelling animals, but how about those great aquatic reptiles of the Mesozoic, the ichthyosaurs, mososaurs and plesiosaurs? How did they evolve from landlubbers to seafarers?

When I saw a story a few days ago of a fossil primitive crocodilian, of the species Thalattosuchia, found in Oregon, I noted how much the artist's rendering looked like an ichthyosaur, despite the lack of a dorsal fin. This made me wonder: Did the ichthyosaurs evolve from primitive crocodilians? Evidently not, since the earliest thalattosuchian fossils found so far are from the Jurassic, while ichthyosaurs appeared as early as the Triassic, though they are believed to have evolved from more primitive diapsids that may also have been ancestral to crocodilians. That raised another question: Could crocodilians have evolved from ichthyosaurs, thus providing an example of evolution taking one group of creatures from land to sea, then back to a semi-terrestrial existence? Again, the answer seems to be no, as fossil crocodilians (but not thalattosuchians) have also been found in Triassic strata.

So, the superficial resemblance between thalattosuchians and ichthyosaurs (long beaks; vertical, fish-like tails) may be an example of convergent evolution.

Update: On the subject of Triassic crocs, Brooklyn Heights Blog colleague (if a newbie to the team may be so bold) qfwfq kindly gives me a link to a piece about an early croc, Effigia okeeffeae, "discovered" in a collection of unclassified fossils at the American Museum of Natural History. This critter ran on two legs and bore a strong resemblance to ornithomimid dinosaurs that didn't appear until the late Jurassic, about eighty million years after Effigia. Ornithomimids are themselves cited as examples of convergent evolution with ratite birds (for example, ostriches), so adding Effigia to the mix gives us an example of triple convergence.

Postscript to "Silly science Saturday"

As a follow-up to my earlier post about the Fair Education Foundation and its argument concerning the "Kabbalistic" foundations of evolution, I strongly recommend this entry from Niles Eldredge's blog, in which Dr. Eldredge imagines a very amusing correspondence between himself and Darwin on this subject.

Update: While we're on the subject of state legislators meddling in scientific matters, there's this news from New Mexico. (Not for nothing do they call it the "Land of Enchantment".)

And yet more: Bad Astronomy gets their dig in at FEF's anti-Copernican campaign.

Silly science Saturday.

Going through today's New York Times, I saw two items that led to the caption of this post. The first takes us, once again, to the Texas legislature. Lest it appear that I'm being unduly harsh to the Lone Star State, though, please note that the mischief here originated in the state of Georgia, with an organization called The Fair Education Foundation, Inc. (see here). What FEF is about is trying to get evolution banned from classrooms because it is based on religion; therefore, teaching it violates the constitutional separation of church and state. Others have made similar arguments, claiming that "scientism", "evolutionism" or "Darwinism" constitutes a "religion" because it rests upon unproven dogma that can only be affirmed through an act of faith. FEF, however, argues that the religious foundations of evolution are in the Jewish mystical tradition of Kabbalah. FEF doesn't cite any Kabbalistic underpinnings for Darwinian natural selection beyond the fact that rabbinical "sages" who contributed to the Kabbalah tradition, in their exegeses of Torah texts, made calculations of the time elapsed since the beginning of creation that anticipated, and are in striking accord with, estimates by modern cosmologists of time elapsed since the "big bang". By positing that the universe has been around for billions of years, instead of the mere six thousand it is constrained to by the exegesis of Genesis that FEF prefers, the Kabbalists and their cosmologist heirs allow sufficient time for evolution to have produced the flora and fauna we have today. Unstated in this argument, but hinted at because he is mentioned in the FEF text, is that Arno Penzias, a co-discoverer, along with his co-worker Robert Wilson, with whom he shared a Nobel Prize, of the cosmic background microwave radiation that evidences the big bang, is an observant Jew.

Incidentally, FEF doesn't stop at seeking to bar the teaching of evolution. They also want to throw out Copernicus. One thing you can say for them is that they have no use for dispensational millenialism, or, if you prefer, pre-millenialism (see here), so they give the back of the hand to Tim LaHaye fans. Unfortunately, they also are Holocaust deniers. Update: when I posted this nine years ago I had links to pages of the FEF website citing Kabbalah and denying Copernicus and the Holocaust. I see now that those pages are no longer accessible, although the one about pre-millenialism is still there.

Anyway, Ben Bridges, a member of the Georgia legislature, produced a one page memorandum summarizing FEF's constitutional argument against the teaching of evolution and distributed it to his colleagues. He also sent a copy to Warren Chisum, the second most powerful member of the Texas House of Representatives, who had it copied and distributed to his fellow legislators. When some of them complained about its substance, Mr. Chisum distanced himself from it, saying that the memo "does not reflect my opinion", and also that he regretted having "hurt or offended some groups including some of my dear friends." He also retained a former legislative colleague, Steven Wolens, who is Jewish, to help with damage control.

Making fun of FEF and its ilk has a fish-in-a-barrel quality (though it's sometimes irresistable), and it's hard to give any credence to the notion that such groups pose any serious threat, especially when we consider recent developments in Kansas. However, the other item that got my attention this morning is, I think, a real and insidious threat, having been endorsed by perhaps the pre-eminent figure in American pop culture. It's described in Maureen Dowd's column, which has the irresistable title, "A Giant Doom Magnet".

The column is about Oprah's latest fave rave: an Australian TV producer named Rhonda Byrne's book, The Secret. If you guessed (you being part of that infinitesimal minority of people who don't watch Oprah) that this is a text that gives you a simple principle by virtue of which you can transform your presently dreary life for the better, bingo. All one need do, saith Ms. Byrne, is to think positive thoughts, and good things will follow. If you're sufficiently into geezerdom, like me, this may strike a mystic chord of memory reaching back to a 1952 opus by The Reverend Norman Vincent Peale, as Dowd notes. If you're a student of modern European intellectual history, it may remind you of this worthy thinker.

According to Ms. Byrne, the converse also holds: negative thoughts beget negative results. Ms. Dowd's title for her column refelects her realization that her negative thoughts about the Bush administration's actions in Iraq serve to amplify the negativity of those actions.

According to Ms. Byrne's acolyte James Arthur Ray, interviewed by Oprah, this is all "very, very scientific." So was phrenology considered, in its time.

"Um, Claude," I can almost hear you, my faithful reader, saying, "what about that 'snark-free' guarantee you proffered in your last post?" What can I say? So sue me.

Addendum: I hate to take issue with a friend, but Rundeep's comment on this post compels me to say this: I love Texas. Yes, I love it in spite of its perhaps greater than average quotient of jingoistic and ultra-fundamentalist nutjobs. I love it for the likes of Ann Richards (see here), Barbara Jordan, and Molly Ivins (see here), as well as for having gotten drunk a few times with Kinky Friedman (see here) (who could sometimes be an asshole, but was always interesting) and Jim Hightower (see here) (who was always a gentleman, but never dull), and for having (at a fundraiser for Jim at the old Lone Star Cafe on 5th Avenue, when he was running for Chair of the Texas Railroad Commission) danced the "Cotton-Eyed Joe" with Cissy Farenthold (see here) and twenty or so other of her nearest and dearest friends. I love it for Terry Allen, Archie Bell and the Drells, Asleep at the Wheel, the Austin Lounge Lizards, the Big Bopper, Guy Clark, Alvin Crow and the Pleasant Valley Boys, Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup, Freddy Fender, Nanci Griffith, Carolyn Hester, Adolph Hofner, Buddy Holly, Lightnin' Hopkins, Flaco Jimenez, Janis Joplin, the Light Crust Doughboys (especially John "Knocky" Parker), Augie Meyer, Mouse and the Traps, Doug Sahm, Joe Tex, the Thirteenth Floor Elevators, Townes Van Zandt, Willie and Waylon and Jerry Jeff, and Bob Wills. I love it for Larry McMurtry. I love it for having spent a couple of formative years in San Antonio when my dad was stationed there in the Air Force, where my Pennsylvania bred mom learned to buy fresh tamales, wrapped in cornhusks, and serve them to us for dinner once a week, and where my fourth birthday present was a Billy the Kid outfit from Joske's.