Richard Dawkins’s new book, and an interview with him today

June 15, 2013 • 6:40 am

Most of you probably know that Richard Dawkins has written a new book, and it will be out on September 24. It’s called An Appetite for Wonder, and you can preorder it on Amazon for less that $19 if you’re in the U.S. Although it’s nominally an autobiography, I’m told that it concentrates heavily on the scientists who knew and influenced Richard over his career.

Here’s the description from Amazon:

Born to parents who were enthusiastic naturalists, and linked through his wider family to a clutch of accomplished scientists, Richard Dawkins was bound to have biology in his genes. But what were the influences that shaped his life and intellectual development? And who inspired him to become the pioneering scientist and public thinker now famous (and infamous to some) around the world? In An Appetite for Wonder we join him on a personal journey back to an enchanting childhood in colonial Africa. There the exotic natural world was his constant companion. Boarding school in England aged 8, and later, public school at Oundle introduce him, and the reader, to strange rules and eccentric school masters vividly described with both humorous affection and some reservation. An initial fervent attachment to Church of England religion soon gives way to disaffection and, later, teenage rebellion. Early signs of a preference for music, poetry and reading over practical matters become apparent as he recalls the opportunities that entered his small world. Oxford, however, is the catalyst to his life. Vigorous debate in the dynamic Zoology Department unleashes his innate intellectual curiosity; and inspirational mentors together with his own creative thinking ignite the spark that results in his radical and new vision of Darwinism, The Selfish Gene. From innocent child to charismatic world-famous scientist, Richard Dawkins paints a colourful, richly-textured canvas of his early life. Honest self-reflection and witty anecdote are interspersed with touching reminiscences of his best-loved family and friends, literature, poetry and songs. We are finally able to understand the private influences that shaped the public man who more than anyone else in his generation explained our own origins.

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This volume spans the period from Richard’s birth to the publication of The Selfish Gene; a second, which will appear in 2014, goes from 1976 to the present.

Reader Ross notes that there will be an interview with Richard about the book today at 5:15 (US Eastern Time) on C-Span2 (go here to watch):

Richard Dawkins, author and biologist, discusses his soon-to-be published memoir An Appetite for Wonder: The Making of a Scientist.  Mr. Dawkins talks to BookTV at Book Expo America, the publishing industry’s annual trade show held at the Javits Convention Center in New York City.

I’m jealous: the man is a writing machine!

 

 

Caturday felids: cat contest winners and miscellanious moggieana

June 15, 2013 • 6:16 am

First things first: at exactly 5 p.m. yesterday, closing time for the Cat Beard Contest, I took a screenshot of the final tally:

Cat beard voteTo refresh your memory, here is number 1, from a reader nicknamed, curiously enough, “Moggy”:

Cat #1

And number 4, from a reader named Pam:

Cat #4Actually, these were my favorites, too, as they were true cat beards.

Because the votes were so close between these two, and I’m a nice guy as well, I’m going to award two autographed books, one to each of these two winners. So Pam and Moggy, please email me with your contact details, and books will be on the way.

Thanks for all who entered!

*****

Reader Michelle sent me this photo, indicating that it wasn’t a “cone of shame” (the cone doctors put around the head of cats to prevent them from licking wounds; it apparently acts as an accidental litter scoop), but a “placard of shame.” It’s truly sad, and reminds me of the Cultural Revolution when Chinese miscreants were forced to wear such signs (from Melissa Wakin at Google Plus):

Picture 3Look at that expression!

*****

Finally, on his website, reader Nash Turley, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Toronto, writes about seeing a tuxedo cat outside his window. He lifted up his own cat, the furry Shamrock, to see the interloper, and a kerfuffle ensued. First the screenshot, then the video.  Note the malevolent expression on the tuxedo cat: who says you can’t read cat’s emotions on their faces? (see above as well):

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New Simon’s cats: “Screen grab” and “Flower bed”

June 14, 2013 • 1:40 pm

Simon’s Cat must be more popular than I thought: this video (which I missed) was posted April 12 but already has nearly three million views on YouTube. It is an animated disquisition, à la Rabbis Sacks, on the emptiness of modern materialistic existence (read “atheism”), symbolized by the television. The feather, of course, is religion.

And this one was posted just today: it’s short and, well, sort of sweet.  Trigger warning: Defecation.

You can watch all the videos here, and here is a picture of Simon Tofield’s real moggies (he haz four):

Picture 5

Have a good weekend (I’ll be here all weekend, folks!).

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Australian television mocks religion

June 14, 2013 • 10:32 am

This hilarious antireligious clip, taken from a 2011 episode of the Australian show “The Chaser”, was sent by reader Barry, who notes:

There’s no chance anything like this would ever appear on American television. Can you imagine the outrage if this appeared on Tosh.O or if Jimmy Fallon or Jay Leno ran such a segment?

Truefact, but a pity, because it’s funny!

Remarkable camouflage in birds

June 14, 2013 • 8:29 am

You’ve probably guessed that I have a penchant for mimicy and “crypsis” (camouflage); I suppose it’s because the phenomena demonstrate the remarkable results that can be achieved by natural selection. For mimicry and crypsis are two of the few adaptations for which we know what the “target” is—complete resemblance or camouflage—and therefore we can judge how much natural selection can be impeded by things like evolutionary constraints or the lack of available mutations.

In the case of these two tawny frogmouths (Podargus strigoides) from Australia, they’re pretty damn cryptic. [Note: several readers seem to have missed the “two”in the preceding sentence. Note that there’s a parent and an offspring in the first picture.]

I know of few birds for which selection for camouflage is so obvious (photo from Parks Australia). Do note, as well, that there was probably selection for behavior as well: the behavior to sit on appropriate trees and hunker down motionless.

W-Longmore-MV-Tawny-Frogmouth

Here’s a frogmouth that not’s so camouflaged: an albino (and its normally-colored conspecific)  (from Environmental Graffiti [more great photos there],image by Alicia Carter).  All tawny frogmouths are born pure white, but turn brown and mottled with age. This one, judging from the lack of pigment in the eyes, seems to be a genuine albino rather than a leucistic variant.

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h/t: SGM

Have they no shame?

June 14, 2013 • 5:49 am

I recently posted the only existing video of Anne Frank, a Dutch Jew who lived in hiding from 1942 until 1944. She, as well as her family and others cloistered in the “secret annex” of a friend’s house, were arrested in 1944 and transported to the camps. Of the seven arrested, only one (Otto, Anne’s father) survived. Anne and her sister Margot died of typhus in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in April 1945, only a few weeks before it was liberated by the Allies.  Anne was 15, Margot 19.

Anne intended that book she composed in hiding, now called The Diary of a Young Girl, would be published as a novel after the war, but of course she never saw that. Her grieving father ensured that it was published, and it’s well worth reading. Predictably, there were “diary deniers,” who asserted that the entire composition was a fabrication. But forensic analysis, handwriting comparison, and other techniques showed without any doubt that the diary was authentic.

If you’re in Amsterdam, a visit to the house and “secret annex” is mandatory.

Sadly, Anne Frank’s image has been coopted in the crassest way by BDSAmsterdam, the Dutch wing of the BDS Movement (“Boycotts, Divestment, and Sanctions”).  The movement aims to use the three weapons of its acronym to force Israel to stop what BDS sees as the apartheid-like treatment of Palestinians.

Although the movement is supported by people like Desmond Tutu, Alice Walker, and Stephen Hawking, I think it is misguided, taken in by a victim narrative perpetrated largely by the left. Indeed, although Israel bears some guilt in the continuing conflagration (most especially in their refusal to give up the West Bank and encouraging settlement in that area), so do the Palestinians, who engage in deliberate, targeted murder of Israeli civilians. Indeed, the Hamas charter of 1988 not only calls for the extirpation of the State of Israel, but touts the fictitious and anti-Semitic document “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” as evidence for a Jewish plan of worldwide domination.

I am especially opposed to academic boycotts of Israel, as I would be of academic boycotts against Palestine or anyone else, for I see academics, like sports, as a community that is international, transcending political differences.

But that aside, and regardless of how you feel, about Israel, I think most of us will agree that the new Twitter image of BDS Amsterdam, showing Anne Frank in a keffiyeh (the Palestianian scarf, now a symbol of the resistance), crosses the bounds of decency:

Screen shot 2013-06-13 at 6.02.10 PM

Many members of BDS favor not a two-state solution (my choice), but the complete elimination of the State of Israel. They are living in la-la land.

If Israel had existed in the 1940s, Anne Frank would have celebrated her 84th birthday on Wednesday.

Wolf spider and offspring

June 14, 2013 • 4:35 am

I guess I hadn’t realized that wolf spiders schlep their young around on their backs. But the ever-reliable Wikipedia (Greg will dissent, and is preparing a post on the iniquities of Wikipedia) says this:

Wolf spiders are unique in the way that they carry their eggs. The egg sac, a round silken globe, is attached to the spinnerets at the end of the abdomen, allowing the spider to carry her unborn young with her. The abdomen must be held in a raised position to keep the egg case from dragging on the ground, however despite this handicap they are still capable of hunting. Another aspect unique to wolf spiders is their method of infant care. Immediately after the spiderlings emerge from their protective silken case, they clamber up their mother’s legs and crowd onto her abdomen.

Reader Laurel Yohe, a graduate student in ecology and evolution at the State University of New York, sent this photo and a note. Do enlarge it (preferably twice) to see the gazillion baby spiders.

Any help with the identification appreciated:

I saw this mother wolf spider running around my yard in Stony Brook, NY. At first I thought it was eggs she was carrying on her back–but after I took the photo I saw all of her little babies. They are too cute for words. Not sure of the species, any taxonomists out there able to help identify? Taken on June 2, 2013 (around 10AM) in my backyard with Nikon D5100 AF-S DX Micro Nikkor 40mm f/2.8G (ISO 200 f/8 1/250). Be sure to look at it in full screen!

spider

UPDATE: Reader Al Denelsbeck, a nature photographer who has his own website (Wading-In Photography), sent two pictures of wolf spiders as well; the first shows one carrying her egg case on a raised abdomen (see above); the second shows another passel of offspring.  These were taken in Hillsborough, North Carolina:

CoynesWolf2

CoynesWolf4