Oh no, it’s a meme

Herbert Spencer would be so proud.

One quibble: evolution by natural selection isn’t the fundamental concept, it’s evolution, change, by multiple mechanisms.

The red button comic is also relevant.

Yeah, because it’s virtually impossible to teach a creationist anything.

Observations from the Spider Lab

It was a busy morning, good thing I got in early today.

  • I have too many spiders.
  • I fed the growing horde of 2nd generation Steatoda triangulosa. I’m discovering that after their 3rd molt, they are no longer content to wait quietly in their tubes for flies to rain from the sky — they rush for the exits when I pop the tops, which means I have to work fast to feed and re-cork everyone.
  • Two spiders escaped this morning. I let ’em go, I’ve got too many spiders.
  • The first of the 3rd generation hatched out today, after 26 days of incubation. There were 45 of them. These are the progeny of 2g-4 and 2g-7. I put about half of them into individual vials and threw a bunch of flies at the remainder. I have too many spiders.
  • Another 3g egg sac was laid a day after the 4-7 sac. I think that means I’ll have another hatching soon. More spiders!
  • Looking ahead, these 3g spiders should reach maturity sometime in November, I’ll do another round of matings and get some more egg sacs around that time, and then…the 4th generation for Christmas. Even more spiders.

If I keep this up, I do believe I’ll be able to start doing some genetics in the spring, optimistically.

New baby picture at the Patreon.

A nice summary of human evolution

It’s a listicle, of course, but it’s written by an archaeologist, which is good, but she was the recipient of a Templeton grant, which triggers my skepticism. But she makes 6 points about our history:

Species such as Homo Longi have only been identified as recently as 2018. There are now 21 known species of human.

And 20 of them went extinct. We’re part of a dying tree.

Hybrid species of human, once seen by experts as science fiction, may have played a key role in our evolution. Evidence of the importance of hybrids comes from genetics. The trail is not only in the DNA of our own species (which often includes important genes inherited from Neanderthals) but also skeletons of hybrids.

Our sexy ancestors were mating with everything that looked vaguely human. Keep that in mind when the dudebros are whining about how Western women aren’t meeting their high standards of beauty. They’d fuck a chimp if one offered the opportunity.

However, many of the changes in our human evolutionary lineage maybe the result of chance.

For example, where isolated populations have a characteristic, such as some aspect of their appearance, which doesn’t make much difference to their survival and this form continues to change in descendants. Features of Neanderthals’ faces (such as their pronounced brows) or body (including large rib cages) might have resulted simply from genetic drift.

Oh, dear, the evolutionary psychologist won’t like that. Too bad, it’s true.

The origins of our own species coincided with major shifts in climate as we became more distinct from other species at these points in time. All other species of human seem to have died out as a result of climate change.

…and we’re next, at the rate we’re going.

The trail of human compassion extends back one and a half million years ago. Scientist have traced medical knowledge to at least the time of the Neanderthals.

Altruism has many important survival benefits. It enabled older community members to pass on important knowledge. And medical care kept skilled hunters alive.

We should have listened more closely to Kropotkin, rather than the imperialist colonizers who shaped the early perspectives on evolutionary theory. He was on to something (he also considered climate to be a critical evolutionary force.)

Evolution made us more emotionally exposed than we like to imagine. Like domestic dogs, with whom we share many genetic adaptations, such as greater tolerance for outsiders, and sensitivity to social cues, human hypersociability has come with a price: emotional vulnerabilities.

Counterpoint: Republicans and Tories. Human psychopaths seem to have a decided advantage in the acquisition of power.

Why do macho Texans elect such chickenshit politicians?

I am amused. Yet again, a tough-talking Texas pol disappears into the sunset in a cloud of dust, leaving a mess he doesn’t want to deal with behind him. The tale of the process server who tried to deliver a subpoena to Ken Paxton:

Herrera’s affidavit said that he arrived at Paxton’s house Monday at 8:28 a.m. and was greeted at the front door by a woman who identified herself as Angela. When he told her that he was trying to deliver the subpoenas to Ken Paxton, she told him that the AG was on the phone.

Herrera, who said he recognized Ken Paxton inside the house through glass on the door, offered to wait for him. Angela replied that Paxton “was in a hurry to leave,” according to Herrera, who observed a black Chevy truck in the driveway and then saw another car arrive there.

At about 9:40 a.m., Herrera said he saw Paxton exiting his garage. Herrera walked up the driveway toward Paxton and called out his name, at which point “he turned around and RAN back inside the house through the same door in the garage.”

Minutes later, Angela came out to the truck and opened both the driver-side door and the door behind it, Herrera wrote. A few minutes after she started the truck, “I saw Mr. Paxton RAN from the door inside the garage towards the rear door behind the driver side,” Herrera wrote.

“I approached the truck, and loudly called him by his name and stated that I had court documents for him. Mr. Paxton ignored me and kept heading for the truck. After determining that Mr. Paxton was not going to take the Subpoenas from my hand, I stated that I was serving him with legal documents and was leaving them on the ground where he could get them,” Herrera wrote.

“I then placed the documents on the ground beside the truck. Service was completed at 9:50 am. He got in the truck leaving the documents on the ground, and then both vehicles left,” he wrote.

Maybe he was in a hurry to catch his flight to Cancun.

Hey, Texians, did you know that John Wayne was a draft-dodging coward and that you lost the battle of the Alamo?

How ya doin’, Floridians?

This doesn’t look like pleasant weather.

I think you need a sacrifice. I recommend staking out your governor somewhere in the middle of that storm track. Work fast, it sounds like it’s going to be ripping across the state quickly.

If that’s not enough, you’ve also got an ex-president there who is pretty much good for nothing other than propitiating the gods.

Hooke doesn’t get enough respect

This is an impressive microscope. It doesn’t look like much, but this is the kind of instrument Leeuwenhoek used to make his observations, back in the 17th and early 18th century. I did not know until now that it was a mystery how he could magnify specimens 270 times with a simple lens — we didn’t know exactly how he constructed the lens, and he wouldn’t tell anyone. It was his secret, which is not a proper scientific attitude, but OK, it was his key to fame.

Until now, that is. The secret of Leeuwenhoek’s lenses has been cracked! It turns out he borrowed a technique of Robert Hooke’s and improved on it.

But on his most powerful lens, neutron tomography revealed that Van Leeuwenhoek used another technique entirely. It was almost perfectly spherical and completely smooth, without the sharp rim inevitably created by a traditional grinding cup. Even more tellingly, the lens retained the faint remnants of a snapped stem, concealed by the brass plates since the day Van Leeuwenhoek had placed it there.

The stem is a smoking gun. It’s the unavoidable result of forming a lens by melting a thread of glass until a bead forms on its end and then snapping it off. In other words, to make his greatest lens, Van Leeuwenhoek copied Hooke’s simple recipe from the book that likely inspired him. Cocquyt believes this may explain why he was so circumspect when Hooke asked about his methods; he wanted to avoid giving credit to Hooke himself.

Published in Science Advances last year, Cocquyt’s discovery that Van Leeuwenhoek used a well-known technique reveals a deeper truth about the state of microscopy in the 17th century. It suggests that for all the crafting genius required to make his tiny, super-powered lens, Van Leeuwenhoek’s greatest insight may have been that there was something new to see by making one.

I mean, everyone was copying Robert Hooke in the 17th century and then hiding the fact. Hooke was a real genius, and it makes me wonder why no one wanted to credit him for anything. Apparently, he was an unpleasant character, vain and jealous, and that has damaged his legacy. The lesson: be courteous and nice with your peers!

The most powerful 4 minutes of science communication ever

Prepping for my intro class today, we’re wrapping up the unit on basic Mendelian genetics and a little more. The students are now supposed to understand monohybrid and dihybrid crosses, chromosomes, and the principle of gene mapping. So today we’re going to talk about how genetics has been and can be abused, and how we have a long way to go before we fully understand inheritance. Yeah, we’re going to talk about eugenics and modern distortions of genetics. It’ll be depressing.

Then, to make it even more difficult, I’m sending them home with some reading and an assignment to watch this video of an old man with a funny accent just talking.

We’ll be talking about the subject of ethics in science on Thursday. I can’t let students walk away from instruction in elementary genetics thinking it’s simple and that they’ve been handed the keys to absolute certainty and comprehensive knowledge of the human condition. We’ve got enough of those people.

Poor Dimorphos

It’s just an innocent space rock, didn’t do anyone any harm, but NASA is getting ready to practice its marksmanship and shoot at it from a distance of 7 million miles. It’s getting hit tonight, so you can watch the livestream of the sniper shot right now.

Not the view you want to see through your windshield.

Oz steps on another rake

The man is an embarrassment of failures. His latest? A right-leaning newspaper suggested it would be a good idea to have the candidates publicize their medical status, and Oz leapt into action!

I would not expect that he had medical concerns, and he certainly seems fit, and I don’t think anyone is questioning his health as a reason to disqualify him. Rather, Oz has tried to suggest that Fetterman is in poor health, so he clearly saw this as a way to get in another dig.

Unfortunately, there is one little glitch: that letterhead.

Cool. The primary care physician for this guy who claims to live in Pennsylvania has a Manhattan office overlooking Central Park, a two hour drive from his purported home. How nice for him.

Of course, Fetterman has a response.

Today Dr. Oz confirmed that he does not actually live in Pennsylvania, because no one who does would have a primary care doctor on 5th Avenue in Manhattan.

We didn’t need to know Dr. Oz’s bone density. We need to know whether he would vote to ban all abortions after 15 weeks. We need to know whether he would vote to raise the minimum wage. We need to know whether he even plans to stay in Pennsylvania after the election.

In June, I released a letter from my doctor where he clearly stated that I am fit to serve. Dr. Oz built his entire career by lying to people about health. I trust my actual doctors over the opinion of a charlatan who played on on TV.

This is the most entertaining political race in ages.