Apparently you need to know something about rare granite erosion to understand the evolution of multicellularity
Posted 24 Jun 2012 / 0Science Now “You Owe Your Life to Rock“
A Minor Post, Fossil Data, GeologyShould conservation scientists also be advocates for particular policies?
Posted 24 Jun 2012 / 0Science Insider “Society for Conservation Biology in Turmoil Over Editor’s Ouster“
A Minor Post, Conservation Biology, Ethics, Law, Political Science, Professional Societies, Public Outreach, Public Policy, Science as a careerMusic evolves (culturally!) from noise to song under the influence of human selection
Posted 24 Jun 2012 / 0Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences “Evolution of music by public choice” Science Now “Computer Program ‘Evolves’ Music From Noise” DarwinTunes site I am excited to read this article in full. What’s clear is that this is a pretty “canned” version of cultural evolution, but it is exciting to see this cultural evolution being Read More
A Minor Post, Cultural Evolution, Multilevel Selection, MusicNice summary piece on the state of research into human nature and morality by Agustín Fuentes
Posted 24 Jun 2012 / 0Psychology Today “Busting Myths About Human Nature“
A Minor Post, Human Nature, Social NormsTurtles caught in the act provide new paleontological insights
Posted 24 Jun 2012 / 0Science Now “Turtle Sex—Preserved for the Ages“
A Minor Post, Fossil Data, Sex and ReproductionTim Birkenhead on anthropomorphism and animal emotion
Posted 23 Jun 2012 / 0The Chronicle of Higher Education “Do Birds Have Emotions?” Very interesting animal stories here, so grisly and some inspiring. I never knew about the cooperation between guillemots, but the emotional signs that Birkenhead describes make sense in the context of cooperation: the real purpose of emotions, it seems, is to balance out the costs and Read More
A Minor Post, Adaptation, Articles, Cooperation, EmotionDavid Barash illuminates the “EvoPolitics” of Darwin’s time
Posted 23 Jun 2012 / 0The Chronicle of Higher Education “EvoPolitics” I really appreciate Barash’s reinforcement of the “is-ought” distinction: it is amazing to me how many people still commit the naturalistic fallacy. This is a really enlightening historical review, but I think that it gets the present-day implications wrong. The defining question about the political implications of evolutionary theory Read More
A Minor Post, Articles, Multilevel Selection, PhilosophyA pharma-agricultural tragedy of the commons?
Posted 23 Jun 2012 / 0The Chronicle of Higher Education “As Beef Cattle Become Behemoths, Who Are Animal Scientists Serving?” This is a scary story of corporate tainting of science.
A Minor Post, Ethics, Grants & Funding, Scientific FraudAre there genetic markers for ethnicity?
Posted 23 Jun 2012 / 0The Chronicle of Higher Education “The story of Jewish origins, once the province of historians and religion scholars, is now being told by DNA” There are fascinating implications of the research described in this piece for Isreal’s “right of return” policy.
A Minor Post, Gene-Culture Coevolution, Genetics, Human EvolutionGreat Michael Ruse piece on the politics of resisting religious encroachment on evolutionary biology
Posted 23 Jun 2012 / 0The Chronicle of Higher Education “Evolution in the Classroom: Here We Go Again!” Classic and entire appropriate commentary on Richard Dawkins here!!
A Minor Post, Articles, Creationism, Evolution Education, Religion