Google doodle celebrates ornithologist

October 8, 2013 • 3:32 am

Today’s Google Doodle (right now only in on UK Google, but presumably it’ll appear later on the U.S. Google page) celebrates the 224th birthday of William John Swainson (1789-1855), ornithologist, naturalist, and artist.

I have to admit that I’d never heard of the guy, though I immediately thought he might have given his name to the Swainson’s Hawk,  Looking him up, I discovered that, like many naturalists of his era, he made his name by collecting, describing and drawing many animals and plants. That was sufficient to make his name and get him elected to the Royal Society.

Screen shot 2013-10-08 at 4.57.21 AM

Clicking on the doodle (on the Google page, not here) will take you to a page of information about him.

Later in his life he moved to New Zealand and collected widely in the Antipodes, but his work seems to have gone downhill when he went down under. as the Guardian reports (this seems to have been lifted from Wikipedia):

He later travelled in New Zealand and Australia. During his time in the latter, he was hit by some of the most strident criticism aimed at him by contemporaries.

The Australian National Botanic Gardens (ANBG) noted that much of his work as a botanist – not his usual discipline – was never published by the Royal Society of Tasmania.

Another botanist William Hooker wrote of Swainson’s attempts to define species there: “In my life I think I never read such a series of trash and nonsense. There is a man who left this country with the character of a first rate naturalist (though with many eccentricities) and of a very first-rate Natural History artist and he goes to Australia and takes up the subject of Botany, of which he is as ignorant as a goose.”

The ANBG noted that another Joseph Maiden described Swainson’s efforts as “an exhibition of reckless species-making that, as far as I know stands unparalleled in the annals of botanical literature”.

There are at least nine species of birds named after him:

Here’s one of his drawings (I don’t know the species) taken from The Bibliophile’s Lair:
Swainson1-237x300
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UPDATE: Reader Pete Moulton just sent in a photo he took of a Swainson-named bird. His notes and photo:
 Swainson’s Hawk is indeed named for William Swainson, as is Swainson’s Warbler. I’ve never been fortunate enough to see the warbler, but here’s a photo of a juvenile Swainson’s Hawk in the Sulphur Springs Valley of southeastern Arizona. This one was hawking grasshoppers, stacking up the calories for its upcoming flight to the Argentine Pampas. Swainson’s is a common summer resident and abundant migrant in Arizona.
SWHA_Sulphur Spgs Vly 9-5-10_1732

When a scientist becomes a movie critic

October 7, 2013 • 4:09 pm

Neil deGrasse Tyson got quite exercised while watching the movie Gravity, which seems to be garnering rave reviews. In case you didn’t know, it’s about two good-looking astronauts (George Clooney and Sandra Bullock) who become marooned in a space capsule. I’m sure I’ll see it some day.

Tyson weighed in on Twitter. He wasn’t happy about the science.

Some of his tw**ts:Screen shot 2013-10-07 at 5.59.33 PM Screen shot 2013-10-07 at 5.59.09 PM Screen shot 2013-10-07 at 5.58.11 PM Screen shot 2013-10-07 at 5.57.34 PM

After all that, perhaps wary that’s he’s been too captious, Tyson adds this:

Last

Scientists walk a fine line when calling out inaccuracies in movies involving science: we’re irked by things that could easily have been fixed, but being too critical makes you look like a geek.  I know I was rankled by the movie Evolution (although it featured a reference to “Coyne and Orr” on a classroom blackboard), but I was mostly annoyed that it was a dreadful film.

Did Tyson stay on the right side of the line?

And, if you saw the movie, did you like it?

We aren’t doing so well. . .

October 7, 2013 • 12:24 pm

Take a look at this graph, which plots the life expectancy of American females (red dot) relative to inhabitants of 21 other First World nations, plotted over 26 years.

Yes, life expectancy is rising everywhere, but in the U.S. it’s not rising as quickly.  Just another sign of the dysfunctionality behind the self-proclaimed greatness of America.

I have no idea of the reason for this, but perhaps national health care would have kept us in the middle.

Picture 2

h/t: A tweet from Marcel Salathe, via Matthew Cobb (who wrongly predicted this year’s Nobel Prize in biology)

Michael Enright called out for telling atheists to shut up

October 7, 2013 • 9:48 am

A few days ago I criticized an essay by Michael Enright’s broadcast on the CBC, “Could atheists please stop complaining?”  It was a particularly nasty piece, motivated by Ceiling Cat knows what.

But the Friendly Atheist, Hemant Mehta, had an even better post, “No, we won’t be quiet about our atheism.” Hemant’s site also put up a special cartoon by M. J. Shepherd about Enright’s piece, which was right on the mark:

Shepherd

On October 1, The Canadian Atheist website posted the cartoon, and among the comments was this one—from Enright’s executive producer!

Picture 1

The Canadian Atheist site updated the fallout yesterday, adding a link to the CBC’s compendium of reader comments about Enright’s piece. As the CBC notes, “The majority of the notes we received took Michael firmly to task.”  Among those notes were these two:

From Jason Rattray, in Regina:

“We’re done being polite.  And I mean forever.  Atheists are coming out in droves, some organizing and banding together in a more organized fashion, while others simply admit their beliefs and no longer just call themselves “undecided” or “don’t have a religion”.
The biggest benefit to a loud, aggressive and unapologetic atheism movement, is the safe foundation that it provides other atheists.
It’s ok to be atheist.  You don’t have to be aggressive, but you don’t have to hide anymore.
Human advancement has been stifled by religion long enough.
As long as debates such as ‘Creationism vs. Evolution’ continue, we can’t afford to stop complaining. And we won’t.”

This came from Hilary Knight in Victoria:

“Well, Michael, for years I have listened to your opinions, often agreeing with you, sometimes civilly begging to differ. But your remarks on atheism left me more steamed than my Sunday latte.
As an agnostic-listing-to-atheism, I will “whisper” my opinions when the shrieks of religious fundamentalists fall silent.  They do not howl their idiocies in a vacuum.  They hurt and destroy bodies and minds, especially women’s bodies and minds.
You made these comments shortly after the events in Pakistan and Kenya, perpetrated by ignorant barbarians convinced that their pet fairy tale is the Truth.
A raspberry to your “whispers.”  Silence is consent.”

That’ll show him! My faith in Canada is restored, as it was yesterday for Muncie, Indiana.  The more people who kvetch about inanities and religion-osculation like that of Enright, the more people will see that there are like-minded folks out there.

Oh, and apparently last week Enright had a discussion at a cathedral in Kingston with Anglican Bishop Michael Oulton on the topic, “Does God have a place in the 21st century?” The plan was “to explore the case for and against God (and the Church) in an intelligent conversation, where people of differing views listen to each other, explore common ground, and respectfully agree to disagree.”

That sounds like the conclusions were preordained, and lame.  I don’t want to respectfully agree to disagree, I want to agree to keep arguing. Now I’m not sure how this conversation went, or what Enright, an atheist-basher, said. If anyone was there, or finds a report of this discussion online, weigh in below.

h/t: Veronica

An amazing grass moth mimicking… a spider?

October 7, 2013 • 7:20 am

by Matthew Cobb

Moar amazing things from Tw*tter. Spotted by @CMBuddle, retweeted by reader Dom (@HStiles1), this superb grass moth from the East Khasi hills in Eastern India, just to the north of Bangladesh.

Spinner

The photographer, rohtmig, identifies it as a member of the genus Siamusotima. It appears to be Siamusotima aranea, so called because when its wings are stretched out it looks like a spider, although rohtmig appears to disagree with this on his/her webpage. It could be another Siamusotimid.

Here’s another lovely example that was originally on Flickr here. This moth was photographed by John Horstman in Pu’er, Yunnan, China:

Horstman writes:

This moth is very similar to a recently described moth (originally from Thailand in 2005) called the Lygodium Spider Moth because it feeds on Lygodium species, an invasive Old World climbing fern, and has markings that look like a spider (possibly mimicry to protect it from predators).

Here’s another picture taken from here (no credit)

Siamusotima aranea was originally described in 2005 in the Annals of the Entomological Society of America, and it turns out the larva is also pretty cool:

The adult and larva exhibit extraordinary morphological modifications whose functions are unknown but may presumably be for defense against predators and/or parasites. The wing pattern of the adult (Figs. 1A and B) resembles legs held in a laterigrade fashion resembling those of the Thomisidae, the crab spider family (J. Miller, personal communication). There have been a few behavioral observations on adult moth species mimicking spider behavior in defense against spider predation (Manu 2003, Rota 2003, Aiello and Becker 2004), but it has not been observed in S. aranea. The larvae S. aranea have a morphological adaptation of the anal shield that does not occur in any other known stem-boring pyraloid that may provide protection from predation and/or parasitism. The anal shield is modified as a cup-like structure with a margin surrounded by setae (Fig. 4A–C), very similar to that of some beetle larvae (Fig. 4D–F), specifically Amarygmini tenebrionid larvae (Spilman 1969).

 Here’s the picture of that bizarre cup-like structure at the rear end:

Reference:
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PS Yes, I was wrong about the Nobel for Phyiosology or Medicine 2013. It did not go to my three nominees, but instead to James E Rothman, Randy W Schekman and Thomas C Südhof for their work on vesicles in cell trafficking. Congratulations to those three, and here’s to 2014 for Hall, Rosbash and Young!
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Still more on the Jesus and Mo kerfuffle

October 7, 2013 • 5:36 am

A few days ago I described censorship at the London School of Economics, where secular students at the Fresher’s Fair were forced to cover up their Jesus and Mo teeshirts, and remove “offensive” material (i.e., stuff critical of Islam) from their booth. This, apparently, was the doing of the Student Union of the LSE, and supported by the school itself.

I wondered exactly what those J&M shirts showed that was considered so offensive.  Well, the Jesus and Mo artist has now revealed what they were on his/her Twitter feed, and has offered a high-resolution image of one so you can make your own shirt and be equally offensive.

Here they are, with a link to the hi-res version.  

Shirt 1 design:

Picture 3

Isn’t that just over-the-top offensive?

Shirt 2:

Picture 2

You can support this worthy artist by buying Jesus and Mo goodies at CafePress.

If you want to see political correctness gone wild—and in England!—here’s the policy of the London School of Economics Student Union on “Islamophobia”, with footnotes omitted (download original here, click to enlarge):

Picture 3

Note the disingenuousness: the Union believes in the right to criticize religion and in freedom of speech and thought—so long as it doesn’t involve Islam.  What an odious document! Must one say again that “Islamophobia” is not racism, since Muslims aren’t a race?

Note as well that any criticism of Islam, it seems, is “deliberate targeting of one religious group with the intent or effect of being Islamophobic.”  Islam happens to be the most invidious and repressive of the world’s most popular religions, and that’s why it’s being singled out—though Christianity is hardly neglected!  It’s as if one couldn’t criticize the Conservative party because you’re singling it out by not also criticizing Labour!

Since there’s only one brand of atheism, I wonder if an anti-atheist shirt would be banned for singling out disbelief?