Inequities breed arrogance everywhere » « The only good thing about the Iowa primaries

I have a brand new perspective on my class this term!

I’m teaching genetics. It’s pretty much 15 weeks of pushing flies around in the lab, although I have to say I do lecture about plant and bacterial genetics, so it’s not all animal stuff. But I have learned from Cell that I’m thinking about it all wrong.

fliesnotanimals

I’m now trying to figure out what kind of class this is. Am I teaching botany now? Or microbiology? Maybe flies are just ambulatory fungi now. I can never keep up with the taxonomy.

(via Björn Brembs)

Inequities breed arrogance everywhere » « The only good thing about the Iowa primaries

Comments

  2. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    flies and animals
    ???
    reminiscent of my high school band leader calling the band to perform, with the snark, “all musicians AND drummers, to the stage”*smirk*chuckle*
    regardless
    I’m sure “flies” were in the phrase for emphasis, not as being a different category. “Flies” to be specific, “animals” to be generic.
    Still amusing, even when understood it was not a F__-up.
    *smirk*

  3. Björn Brembs says

    In fact, I just put this in as my first slide for my evolutionary biology course which starts this coming Monday :-)

  4. latveriandiplomat says

    It’s mistranslated from the King James Version, which used the correct terms “beasts” and “creeping things” :-)

  5. Marshall says

    It does seem absurd–is it possible that they explain this odd terminology somewhere in the introduction? As in a sentence saying, “We’re aware the term ‘animal’ has multiple uses, most often referring to species in the kingdom Animalia. In this book, however, we adopt a different definition in order to…” or something…?

  7. moarscienceplz says

    Why do we treat animals flies like animals flies?
    Animals Flies treat us so very well.
    The devoted ways they serve us
    And protect us when we’re nervous,
    Oh, they really don’t deserve us,
    All we give them is hell!

    Tell me how else man repays them —
    Do we ever think to praise them?
    No we don’t, and this dismays them You can tell.

    We’re riddled with ingratitude,
    We give no love or latitude,
    In every way our attitude
    Is, well, like animals flies.

  8. numerobis says

    Drosophila are clearly evolved from maple seeds. You can tell from the uneven flight, and the wings.

  9. says

    I have long been bothered by this. It’s far more common than seems reasonable.

    Just Google:
    “animals and insects”
    “animals and fish”
    “animals and birds”

    I mean, what unifying characteristic can you apply to “animals” in general, that distinguishes them all from whichever subgroup you’re isolating?

    Seeing that sort of language in a scientific journal, however, is beyond the pale.

  11. says

    I teach introductory zoology (among other things). If I had a dollar for every time one of my students asked me something like “So, do humans have Hox genes, like animals?” or “Do humans go through gastrulation like animals do, or is there some other process?” I would be complaining a lot less about how little faculty are paid in this state.

  12. dreikin says

    Kagato @9:

    I have long been bothered by this. It’s far more common than seems reasonable.
    Just Google:
    “animals and insects”
    “animals and fish”
    “animals and birds”

    I mean, what unifying characteristic can you apply to “animals” in general, that distinguishes them all from whichever subgroup you’re isolating?

    From wiktionary:

    2. In non-scientific usage, any member of the kingdom Animalia other than a human being.
    3. In non-scientific usage, any land-living vertebrate (i.e. not birds, fishes, insects etc.).

    That’s the set of definitions most people seem to mean when using “animal” (in my experience). I didn’t even realize the problem until someone else pointed it out (not that it means something different scientifically, but that they should be using the scientific meaning in that context). Scientific usage of animal is different from common usage, and I don’t think this is new.

  13. dreikin says

    Whoops, forgot to close the blockquote after “3. […]” and accidentally opened a new one instead.