Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
CoyneFest has ended with a long party last night at the log house of my colleague Trevor and Tina in northern Indiana. By all reports, both the scientific meetings and the dinners, booze, and party were great successes. I have lots of photos already, but will just show two now. Both were taken by Andrew Berry.
First: the premier and perhaps only occasion where the three male writers on this site are in one place (we wished Grania were here to make it all four). Left to right: Greg Mayer, me (note the special gold “CoyneFest” button reserved for me; other buttons will be available for a slight donation to Doctors without Borders), and Matthew Cobb, who came all the way from Manchester.
The Log Castle of Trevor and Tina in northern Indiana, near the Indiana Dunes. What a wonderful place for a party! I’m grateful to the owners for hosting us last night.
Jerry and Co are still Festivising, so I am putting up the Hili Dialogue this morning.
Today is the day that Marie Antoinette, poor woman, lost her head in 1793 and also the day Walt Disney Company was founded in 1923. It is also the day that Henry Kissinger received the Nobel Prize for Peace, which shows that the Nobel Committee has a long tradition of making really peculiar choices.
Over to Dobrzyń.
Hili: This is like squaring a circle.
A: I don’t understand.
Hili: Nobody knows how a cat is to inscribe itself into this dog.
In Polish:
Hili: To jakaś kwadratura koła.
Ja: Nie rozumiem.
Hili: Nie wiadomo jak ma się kot w tego psa wpisać.
Reader Charleen Adams has moved to Bristol for a postdoc, and her digs are conveniently next to what I think is Britain’s only cat pub: The Bag of Nails (see here). Here are two photos she took at her local, lucky woman!
Reader Tyler called my attention to the trailer (published yesterday) for BBC’s Planet Earth II, and it looks fantastic. Watch the 3-minutes trailer, as there are plenty of cool animals, with EXTRA FELID. It will be narrated by the legendary David Attenborough, and the Facebook page is here, though I’m not sure when the program will air.
Kudos to the cinematographers!
The YouTube description:
10 years ago Planet Earth changed our view of the world. Now we take you closer than ever before. This is life in all its wonder. This is Planet Earth II.
A decade ago, the landmark television series Planet Earth redefined natural history filmmaking, giving us the ultimate portrait of life on Earth. Planet Earth II, narrated by Sir David Attenborough, will reveal our planet from a completely new perspective, using significant advances in both filming technology and our understanding of the natural world.
And if you are not excited enough already it features an original score by legendary composer Hans Zimmer.
Coming soon!
A BBC Studios Natural History Unit production, co-produced with BBC America, ZDF, Tencent and France Télévisions.
After Bob Dylan received the Nobel Prize for Literature the other day, a few grad school buddies and I had an animated discussion over whether he deserved it (most said “yes”). But I also argued that had Lennon and McCartney both been alive, they would have equally deserved the prize for literature.
When someone sardonically pointed out that Nobels aren’t given for corpses, I continued to argue that Paul McCartney deserved the Prize as much as did Dylan. Well, that may have been hyperbole, but McCartney wrote a number of fantastic “rock” songs: Eleanor Rigby; The Fool on the Hill; the fantastic final medley of Abbey Road; Penny Lane, Here, There and Everywhere; Yesterday, and this classic, supposedly about civil rights. When listening to some of these songs again (and don’t miss this live version by an older McCartney, I found this superb version of “Blackbird” by Sarah McLachlan, which I hadn’t heard. Enjoy it; it’s a good way to start a lazy Saturday.
The Cat Hero of the Month is Radio 1 DJ Nick Grimshaw, who, reported the BBC, swerved his car (an £80,000 Mercedes) while driving to avoid hitting a cat, flipping his own car (presumably damaging it heavily) and also hitting another car. The good news is that Grimshaw and the cat were fine:
“The car went upside down. I’m absolutely fine,” [Grimshaw] told colleagues on the station’s breakfast show.
“I turned out of my house, my car flipped over and went over on its side,” he explained.
“People were like, ‘You can’t have been doing 15 miles per hour.’ I was, that’s how embarrassing this was.
“I came out of my street, turned right, saw quite a large ginger cat. I was like, ‘Oh no, a cat.’ Rather than killing the cat, I drove into a car.
“The car that I hit made my car tip over. The woman’s car is absolutely fine… She needs a new wheel arch, which I guess I’m paying for.”
. . . “The cat’s fine. It sat there for the full two hours while I was out in the street,” he said.
“The cat met the police, the cat met the fire brigade, the cat watched me make a call to insurance to organise someone to pick the car up.”
Nick Grimshaw was on his way to make a guest appearance on Annie Mac’s show to discuss the new Frank Ocean album, alongside MistaJam.
Instead he waited on the street, as his £80,000 G-Wagon was towed away.
A statement from his agent confirmed the news, saying: “”Nick is absolutely fine – he was driving at no more than 15mph and he swerved to avoid a cat.”
The cat, thought to be a local stray tabby, is said to be fine as well.
GrimshawHis car. No picture is available of the cat.
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Cat massages. Here is one thing a cat can do that a dog can’t. Who says that cats are of no practical value?
Good for the lower back, too . . .
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Finally, yet another adorable example of interspecific love. The YouTube notes say this:
A 16-year-old cat called Rosinka has adopted a baby monkey which was abandoned by its mother in a Russian zoo. (Aug. 23).
Somehow I don’t think this amity will continue when the squirrel monkey grows up!
Today is October 15, 2016, the last day of Coynefest, which will repair after lunch to a big cabin in the Indiana woods for PARTY TIME! Here’s a photo from yesterday’s festivities, which reminds me a bit of the Crucifixion panel in the Isenheim Altarpiece. Front left: Bruce Grant, my undergraduate mentor at William & Mary, and also the mentor of Mohamed Noor (my second student, behind him), and mentor as well of Allen Orr, my first student (rear, right). Front right: John Willis, a Ph.D. student at Chicago, now a professor at Duke, and whose father, as Dean of Students at William and & Mary, was also a mentor of mine. Mohamed is just finishing up as chair of Evolutionary Biology at Duke, and Allen is a the Shirley Kearn Cox Professor at the University of Rochester. More on CoyneFest when the dust has settled on Monday.
(Christ analogy not intended)
Today is also Global Handwashing Day, and remember to scrub your mitts for twice as long as it takes to sing the first verse of “Happy Birthday to You.” On this day in 1793, Marie Antoinette was convicted in a French kangaroo court, and executed the next day. On this day in 1951, the first episode of I Love Lucy (the source of the names of Stephen Barnard’s eagles) aired on CBS television. And, in 1969, The Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam was held in Washington D.C., along with similar demonstrations throughout the U.S.. Over 250,000 people showed up in Washington, and I was one of them.
Notables born on this day include P. G. Wodehouse (1881), Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. (1917), and Sarah, Duchess of York (1959). Those who died on this day include Mata Hari (1917; executed by the Germans), Hermann Göring (1946, suicide while imprisoned), Cole Porter (1964), and Vincent Canby (2000). Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Andrzej carries Hili to the couch, but she reminds him that she’s The Decider of her own comfort:
A: I will carry you from my armchair to a more comfortable place.
Hili: The level of comfort is judged by the body itself, not by a bystander.
In Polish:
Ja: Przeniosę cię z mojego fotela na jakieś wygodniejsze miejsce.
Hili: Poziom komfortu ocenia własne ciało, a nie osoby postronne.
In nearby Wloclawek, tabby Leon is taking shelter from the storm:
Leon: Here I am, why are you surprised? It’s blowing.
A friend sent me this sarcastic comment on Bob Dylan’s winning the Nobel Prize for Literature:
Philosopher and writer Stephen Law made a short video (in collaboration with CfI and the British Humanists), in which he argues that one can make a convincing argument that if a god exists, theology tells us he’s more just as likely to be evil as good.
If you are interested in following what’s going on at CoyneFest, several of the participants are livetweeting (as opposed to the other type of tweeting presumably – I cringe every time I hear the word) the events and you can follow it on Twitter at hashtag CoyneFest.
