Emergence

Termite mound: Example of an emergence system.
(borrowed from getintravel.com)

The book I read for book club this month touched on something called emergence. And because it's so interesting to me I thought instead of trying to incorporate it into my book review I'd write a separate blog about.
Emergence has come up briefly in a couple other books I've read recently, and I'm pretty fascinated by it at the moment.(Like I was with strange attractors a couple years ago;) But what is it? To borrow the definition from Wikipedia emergence is:
"...the way complex systems and patters arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple reactions."
What this means is that in many systems patterns will begin to emerge that could not be predicted beforehand by looking at any single component of the whole system. Saying it another way, emergence is the production of a pattern or a complex systems by many individual components that could never create anything on their own. Moreover, the system cannot work unless all of the components are in place. It's slightly more complicated than just that, since to create emergent properties a specific amount of energy must be added to the system, but I'll try to explain that below. This is a really cool thing, so I'm going to take a minute to give a couple examples.
Sand ripples: If you look at the components that form sand ripples in the bottom of a lake or ocean you have: Water, wave action (i.e. your energy source), and sand grains. If you  look closely at a sand grain, or a molecule of water, it is unlikely that you could predict how they could ever organize themselves into coherent rows of ripples. But they do. The thing is, they only do it when the right amount of energy (i.e. waves) are present. Too little energy and they will not form. Too much (think big crashing storm waves) and the ripples will be destroyed. But just the right amount, and suddenly sand grains can organize themselves into ripple patterns. Cool right?
Termite nests: This works for hives as well. The components to these systems are earth and millions of individual insects. The energy to the system is how much work each individual can do. Now if you took a single termite and inspected it closely you'd never guess that it could build a mound twenty feet tall. It doesn't even know how to "build"! And you'd be right, a single termite can't build a mound. Even several hundred couldn't, but a few million can, and do. A bunch of individually simple termites can build gigantic mounds taller than a giraffe!
The human brain: Same thing. Your components are individual neurons, and of course the energy comes from the food you eat. If you look at a single neuron you can see how it basically works, but it can't create complex thought...or even simple thought for that matter. All it can do is send and receive chemical signals. You can't make a "sort of brain" with a few hundred neurons. You need a whole skull full of them, all connected together, to be able to think, and learn and know. A brain is not a neuron, a brain is an intricately connected assemblage of many neurons that when acting together produce thoughts and regulate body functions.
So why is this important and interesting to me? This subject of emergence is critical for the transition from non-living to living. The primary reason being that it explains how the evolution of life was able to occur and not conflict with the second law of thermodynamics (i.e.entropy of a system never decreases). To be clear, technically nothing gets around the second law, so ultimately everything does increase in entropy. But small isolated systems like termite mounds, or shallow shore lines, or human brains, can under the right circumstances, for a time, produce amazing and complex things. Using only specific quantities of energy, and relatively simple parts amazing patterns and functions quite literally emerge! I think that is so cool.
Anyway, I'm probably not explaining this super well, but it's my hope that if you find this subject interesting, you will look it up and do some reading on your own! I am sure there are authors out there who have done a much better job than me. On is Dr. Robert Hazen who wrote the book Genesis: The Scientific Quest for Life's Origin that I read for book club this month.

My Little Cheep Cheeps

Proud Parents:
Cheep Cheep (on left) and Cheeper (on right) 

For the most part my little patio garden is devoid of any living things besides those that creep or crawl....or shimmy (is that what snails do?). But every spring, for the last 3 years I have noticed that a couple birds (actually 4 last year) seem to find my hanging spider plants an ideal location to nest. But never before has it resulted in chicks. The first year it rained and a gutter broke and practically washed all the dirt out of the pot along with nest. Last year a ornery old cat came and knocked the plant over,  (I still don't want to think about what happened after that).
So this year I made sure I moved my hanging spider plant to be both out of the rain, AND in a place that felines can't reach. And just like clock work, my little birds came back! There were only two this year (I had 2 doves also last year, but I think the cat ate them because there were feathers....lots and lots of feathers...)
And sure enough they made a little home in my spider plant! When I got home from Alaska, about two weeks ago the pair, Cheeper (Momma bird) spent most of her time in the nest, while Cheep Cheep (Poppa bird) spend most of his time "cheeping" at me and trying to distract me from said nest.
Then about a week and a half ago I was outside watering my plants when I heard the weirdest noise. It was like a high pitched screeching noise. Kind of like an "eeeeeeeeee". Then as suddenly as it began it would stop. Meanwhile Cheep Cheep was practically having a heart attack and jumping all over the place, fluttering around me, and getting much closer than normal. That was when I realized I was getting awfully close to the nest with my watering can. So I backed away and took a seat at my patio table and waited. Soon Cheaper was back, and she took a sort of incremental path to the nest watching me the whole time while Cheep Cheep was STILL jumping around making a racket and trying to distract me. She wouldn't fly up there if I was looking right at her, so I had to hide behind my sunglasses and turn my head a little in the other direction. Then she'd go from her lookout on the fence to the olive tree....wait, and check on me...then from the olive tree to the bistro table.....wait, check on me again....and then quickly up to the nest, where I immediately after heard "eeeeeeeee".
My birds had babies!!! Hooray! I was super excited. It sounded like two or three, but I never got close enough to actually look in the nest because I was afraid that Momma and Poppa would have a heart attack and die, or worse, abandon their little ones.
For about a week after that as soon as I got home from work I'd open the sliding door and listen to my little avian family. And it was always the same routine. Cheep Cheep was the lookout, and first responder whenever I stepped outside on the patio. He was relentless in chirping at me and never stopped until I went inside. Cheaper was a diligent mother going back and forth, back and forth, with food for her babies. I think she trusted Cheep Cheep to keep me distracted because she never went out of her way to ward me off. She only made sure I wasn't looking when she flew into the nest with her mouthful of green little worms and insects.
I managed to take a photo of the nest from afar by holding up my camera, and zooming in, but it's not a great shot, and I didn't dare try to get any closer for fear of attack by Cheep Cheep.
And then on Sunday morning I noticed a strange silence outside when I opened the sliding door. I stepped out, and Cheep Cheep wasn't there to holler at me. I got close to the plant and whistled, but still nothing. I have no idea how long baby birds take to leave the nest, but it seemed awful quick. I looked around on the ground hoping I wouldn't find little chicks with broken necks anywhere. I didn't.
Then on Monday when I got home from work I almost got dive bombed my Cheep Cheep on the way to the front door. I was like "What the heck?!" as I hurried to unlock the door and rush inside. I peered out the window, and even then Cheep Cheep was fluttering in front of it trying to distract me. I tried to see if maybe somehow the little chicks got out of the nest but couldn't fly, but Poppa was having none of it. I gave up.
Then on Tuesday I was walking to the front door again after work and a little tan and brown striped bird flew up and crashed into my screen door, then got stuck fluttering in the corner of the building. It was swerving (as much as a bird can swerve) all over the place, half falling then, flying up, then tumbling back through the air. At first I thought it was injured.....but then came Cheep Cheep and Cheaper to the rescue (yes she joined in this time). They practically dive bombed me, and  there was birds chirping, and flying things everywhere, and me freaking out in the middle of it all. Finally Cheeparito (the baby) managed to remove himself from my doorway and I was able to dash inside. I spent the next half hour at my kitchen window watching the FedEx, UPS and mailman get harassed by the worried parents. It's much funnier when it's not happening to you. I only saw the one chick, so I don't know if there were others that died or what.
Yesterday I was finally able to grab a couple photo's of my little family or squatters. Cheeparito doesn't look like mom or dad, but he is also much harder to see on the ground than they are, so maybe it's to protect him. I am wondering if his feathers wont change when he is older. I've heard of some birds laying eggs in others nests, so that's a possibility too. Either way he's pretty cute.
As of yesterday he can fly...sort of. And all afternoon he fluttered around the yard and bushes and mom and dad were right behind him. Cheaper is feeding him still. Or maybe she is trying to teach him what to look for and how to feed himself.
You might be wondering how I can tell Cheep Cheep from Cheeper, and it's mostly based on behavior, and the fact that Cheeper always feeds the baby. She stays on the ground looking for bugs and whatever only paying attention to me when I am super close, while Poppa is always between us, and ALWAYS watching me and ALWAYS making noise.
Anyway, I don't know a darn thing about birds really, so all of what I've written is just based on what I saw. Who knows? I could have it backward. Maybe the dad's feed the babies and the moms do all the guarding? I don't even know what kind of birds they are! But I've enjoyed observing them and learning a little about them through good old fashioned observation. Here are a couple photos of the happy family!

Cheeparito in his nest.

Cheeparito outside my kitchen window

Cheeparito. What a cute baby!

Cheeper with an ant in her mouth for baby.

Poppa Cheep Cheep always on the lookout!

Bird Bath

I was just walking to the grocery store to pick up some soup for lunch when I noticed a blackbird taking a bath in a puddle created by a broken sprinkler head. I was amazed by this because it never really occurred to me that a bird is smart enough to take a bath. I mean, isn't that something? Somewhere in their brains is the knowledge and ability see a mud puddle and decide to clean themselves.
First it ruffled its feathers up, then it dipped its wings in the water then immediately shook them off. It did that a couple times, then it dipped it's head and sort of arched it's back and tail feathers up (splashing its back I guess) and repeated the whole process.  I don't know, maybe it's dumb, I certainly feel silly writing about it, but it just struck me when I saw it.
I got to thinking about it on my way back, and wondered exactly why they were doing it. It turns out that they do it for the same reasons we wash our hair, to remove some of the oil, and to keep lice away. Ha ha, isn't that great? If I ever have a reasonably sized back yard, I will have to get a bird bath.

Playing God

(Photo borrowed from article linked below)

This morning I read an article that I found disturbing. I've seen it many times before with different animals, but the story is basically the same. We (humans) mess up a habitat which causes something to go awry within the ecosystem. Then we try to fix it, but really have no idea of the implications of our actions. Then we think we have the right to eradicate one animal, that we decided is somehow the bad guy and doesn't belong, while going out of our way to protect the one that we claim is unfairly being predated and needs to be saved. We compound one wrong by slapping another one on top of it.
This time it involves whales and seagulls. Apparently in Argentina there was an explosion of seagulls due to copious amounts of trash left exposed in landfills and by humans. These particular seagulls are special in that they discovered (about 10 years ago) that they could snack on right whales when they surfaced to breath. So in addition to eating week old french fries and garbage, they also dine on fresh whale meat. It's called adaption, and it's a remarkable, and beautiful thing that life does. It wasn't so bad (for the whales) when the population was small, the whales could stave off a few birds, and the birds got a good meal. But now it is a different story. The birds are many, and not only do they attack adults they also attack the infant whales, creating open sores that are prone to infections. Now the whales are in trouble. Now the gulls are "bad".
The attacks are so intense that whale watching trade has gone down because people are "horrified" to see the birds converge upon the whales as they breach the surface to take a breath.
So what are they going to do? Shoot the seagulls. Can you believe that? There is actually a plan to spend a hundred days following the whales and shooting every seagull that tries to take a bite.
This makes me angry. Not because I don't feel bad for the whales, but because I do feel bad for the gulls. They aren't doing anything wrong. They are doing exactly what any animal in a position of overabundant food  source and no predation would do. Expand and multiply. For crying out loud WE do it, as can been seen by the 6 billion people that inhabit our planet. Should we start shooting people because we take advantage of other animals? We are worse than the gulls.
And it makes me angry that instead of immediately implementing a plan to cut down on the trash left in the open (which would quickly bring the population back into equilibrium, and which they are planning but not till later), they opt to just shoot a bunch of innocent birds.
I think this is not only irresponsible, but just plain stupid. The article I read made the gulls seem like the villains, and the whales like the victims. But that's not true. WE are the villains. The whales and the gulls are both victims. Maybe the gulls a little more so since they will get no sympathy from those of us who get to play god.

For the full article click HERE.

Project Nim

Nim and (true) friend Bob Ingersoll

I rented the movie/documentary Project Nim from Netflix last week. For a long time now I have been interested in learning more about our primate relatives, chimps, bonobos, gorillias etc. I have posted blogs about Lucy, and Washoe, both based on books, and while I've heard of Nim, I was unfamiliar with his story, so I thought I'd check it out.
Just the fact that the title of the film, prefaces his name with "Project" should have warned me that I wasn't going to like it (the content not the cinematography). And true enough, within the first five minutes I was almost in tears. Nim was one of something like 10 babies that the mother Carolyn, had snatched away from her right after birth. She lived in a small cell, with no fresh air or toys and after every one of her babies was born they were taken from her. She knew they were going to be taken, and they had to tranquilize her and then get the baby before she smothered it, trying to protect it. It was so sad and terrible and awful to see the actual video of when they took Nim from his mother.
The film shows footage of Nim growing up, and learning to sign, and in between there are interviews with the people involved in the project. The douche-bag womanizing professor in charge, the "research" assistants that happened to be almost exclusively pretty women, his teachers, the animal handlers at the research facility where Nim eventually ended up...
The man in charge, Herb Terrace was....well I can't even say exactly what I think of him here because it would be probably be offensive to some, and very unlady-like for sure. But basically he thought of Nim as a big furry...goldfish, something that had no self-awareness or feelings at all. And so he just did whatever he felt like, with not so much as a hint of remorse for the suffering he was creating. He took Nim first from his mother, then just as abruptly took him from his foster mother, then after several years, when Nim got too big, he just up and ended the project and dumped the chimp off at the grossly under-achieving place where he had been born. A chimp who had been raised as a person, who wore clothes, and liked to play with his pet cat, and slept in a bed was suddenly thrown in a cage and treated like an animal. I cannot even begin to express how angry it makes me to think that people got away with doing things like that, without any consequences.  As far as I am concerned I think Herb Terrace should spend the rest of his life in prison for what he did. Put him in a cage and see how he likes it.
That wasn't even the end of it, nor the worst of it either. Nim, and all the other chimps at the place where he was taken were sold to a research facility where they were testing vaccines for hepatitis and other stuff. They had some video of the researchers infecting the chimps, and the tiny cages they were housed in, and I actually felt physically sickened by the sight of it. It is...I don't understand how someone could see what I was seeing and not think it was wrong. There was Nim trying to sign to them to let him out of his cage, or to play with him, or hug him, and they didn't have the sense that injecting him with an infectious and painful disease was inhumane? He was talking to them for crying out loud!
Eventually Nim, and some (but not all) of the other chimps were rescued, but it wasn't an easy life for them. They were in cages for the rest of their lives, sometimes with other chimps, sometimes by themselves, lonely and bored, never having a choice or a say in what they wanted. Nim was reunited with his foster mother after ten or so years and his response was not like that of a dog wagging his tail happily. Nim was angry at her. She had betrayed him and he remembered.
The movie was sad but insightful too, and gave a good variety of perspectives of Nim, and chimps in general. The comparisons of him to a human child, the intelligent "person" that he was, the unpredictable beast he could be. (For example he would bite his teachers and then immediately feel remorse and sign that he was sorry for hurting them.) Half of the people who were interviewed said he was essentially a person, the other half said he was just an animal. I think they were both wrong. I think he was both person and wild animal....but, and maybe this is the point that we really need to remember, aren't we all?

Why So Sad?

I went to the San Francisco Zoo this past weekend with my BF. It was a really fun day, but I've decided that I don't think zoo's are ethical. Especially in this day and age when we know so much about other animals, it seems pretty ignorant to think they could ever be happy in the little enclosures zoo's are able to provide.
Especially for primates (and in marine parks I would include dolphins). I think that while certainly not exactly the same as humans, both primates (apes in particular) and dolphins have all the necessary faculties to experience boredom, sadness, hopelessness and probably something similar to depression. And for those reasons I think essentially having a gorilla enclosure, or a chimp enclosure is just as inhumane as capturing a bunch of people and forcing them to live in a trailer together.
Case in point, the silver back gorilla at the zoo the other day. At first he just sat there watching all the people taking pictures of him (myself included). But the longer we stood there the more apparent it was that he was actually watching us. He looked at each person, observed their expression, scowled when a baby started crying. It was weird, but I could tell he was thinking, AND I could read his facial expressions almost as well as I can read a humans. He was sad. And bored....and feeling trapped and helpless. I could actually see the frustration in his eyes! It was so awful, because I know that his situation wont be getting any better. His life is pretty much set, and the rest of it will be spent in that little fenced in patch of land.
After a while he went and sat in the doorway of his shelter, away from the people and the prying eyes. He just sat there, frowning, and sighing, shaking his head and rubbing his eyes and brow in exactly the same way I do when I am stuck at work and itching to get out of there. He was so unhappy. Even the little kids noticed and inquired of their parents why he was so sad.Ironically most of the parents couldn't see it. They said things like "He's not sad. That's just what gorillas look like."
The chimps were in no better situation. If anything their enclosure was worse. Not that the zoo people aren't trying, but what I mean is that compared to their natural habitat even the best enclosures fall woefully short. And this was not the best. The chimps seemed a little...crazy. I've read a great deal about them, and at least have a marginal grasp on their habits, and the chimps there were...off. Like they were patients in a mental hospital. One was zoned out, another grooming himself to the point of rubbing bald spots into his hair. They had a sedated/ bang-your-head-against-a-wall kind of vibe going on.
But the enclosures for many of the other animals were just as inadequate. The bears, lions, tigers, all had such small areas. They couldn't even get up to a full speed run in the space available to them. Again, I don't think zoo keepers are out to emotionally scar the animals, but...For as much as I enjoyed seeing them in real life it just felt...wrong.
To take a polar bear away from it's home on thousands of miles of moving ice, and put him in a 3,000 square foot enclosure just seems...terrible. To take a hippo who's natural habitat is the whole of the Nile River and put him in a corral with a tiny 10x15' pool of water (that he can barely turn around in) doesn't seem quite right.
For certain animals, like fish, insects, reptiles, most birds, rodents, and domesticated animals I think zoo's are a fine idea. A friend of mine mentioned a particularly content and jolly raccoon at a zoo he visited recently. And the goats at the SF zoo seemed pretty happy to be fed and brushed by patrons. Cool. But to take large animals, or smart ones and force them into tiny spaces for the rest of their lives is not humane. And I think the whole idea of "captivity" creates a division between us and them that really isn't there. We'd never put people in zoo's (although we do lock them in cells as punishment!) because it would be wrong, on so many levels that are obvious to everyone. So how is OK to put a chimp or gorilla in one? I think the answer is because most people don't see us and "them" as part of a continuum, but as two completely un-relateable things. And that is a mistake. We should know better than that.
And the truth is we don't need zoo's anymore to connect with the animal world. With all the beautiful documentaries out there, and 3d capabilities, we can virtually explore other animals and their awesomeness in their own world, where they belong. And they are more interesting to watch when they are in their native environments, doing what evolution has honed them to do.
I'm not sure what I'd suggest we do moving forward since all the animals currently in captivity probably don't have the skills to survive on their own. Maybe, as sad and unfair as it may be, the only thing to do is let them finish out their lives in the zoo, but stop replacing them with new animals once they are gone.
What do you think? Do you have any thoughts about this issue?

Lilu the Zebra Dove

My friend Lilu

On my trip to Hawaii we did lots of sight seeing. But we also spent several days doing nothing but sitting on the beach. On one such day I met a new friend named Lilu. Lilu is a Zebra Dove who lives near the condo we rented. He came over to say hi, and being a gracious host I shared my sandwich crumbs with him. He spent the whole rest of the day walking circles around our beach chairs. He'd stop and tilt his head and nod, then off he would go again. He'd wander through our stuff exploring, and take a rest in the shade of our umbrella. He was a cute little guy, and what's more, he came back and found us on the beach when we'd head out the next time! You may wonder how I know it was him, since most Zebra Doves look alike, but I am sure it was. He had a certain personality that the other doves didn't have, and he had a ruffled wing feather that never layed quite right that made him recognizable.

On our last beach day he came to visit again. I gave him a little crust of bread while I ate my sandwich, and he spent the afternoon patrolling our little area while I snorkeled, nibbling his snack, preening in the shade of our umbrella while we napped under it, and hanging out. He disappeared for a while, and I thought he'd gone without saying goodbye, but he appeared moments later with a "lady friend".
So me and my BF, and Lilu and his girlfriend spent the afternoon enjoying each others company and the beautiful beach. I was sad when it was time to say goodbye to my new friends, but who knows, maybe we will meet again someday?

See Turtles? Sea Turtles!

Sea Turtle!!!

One of the reasons I chose our condo in Hawaii was because the reviews indicated that there were sea turtles in the ocean right out our door.

On our first morning there, while I was sitting on the balcony sipping my coffee, my eyes spotted an unusual white "thing" in the water. It would appear every now an then (always in a different place) and then disappear again under the water. I hurried and got dressed and ran down to the beach to investigate. Along the way I met a pretty female rock crab (not sure what kind specifically, maybe Metopograpsus messor) who was as interested in me as I was in her.
As I scanned the horizon I looked for the little white "thing" and eventually it surfaced again. I was still a little ways away, but the water was pretty clear, and I was at once able to make out a large dark disk, and flippers. Our eyes met and it looked right at me. It was so awesome! I don't mean awesome like "totally rad" I mean really awesome, as in it's dictionary definition: inspiring awe.

Rock Crab

It was just a moment, five seconds tops, but I have thought about it a lot since. I think about that turtle and wonder where it might be at this very moment. And I wonder where it was born, and when. (It could be a hundred years old!) And then I think about myself and my life and where I am at this very moment typing,  and it's almost mind boggling how unlikely it is that the two of us, different species, different genus even, should ever cross paths and occupy the same moment at the same time. (I love that about life, and how it's so predictably unpredictable. Almost everything that happens in life is so unlikely to have ever occurred when you look at it from hindsight. And so in a way our lives are one  long string of events that most likely should never have happened at all. And that's pretty cool. But I digress...)
We saw several other turtles along the rocky coast, presumably foraging along the bottom, and even once in a while they popped up to the surface to take a breath.
A couple hours later we were snorkeling, and an older man and his wife pointed us in the direction of a sea turtle they had seen earlier. We found it no problem since there was nothing else in the vicinity that was as big or as darky colored (thank goodness!). It didn't seem to mind  at all our distorted snorkel faces hovering overhead watching and pointing. It sort of swayed with the current and perused the rocky bottom for seaweed or algae or whatever it was eating. The swaying effect of the water on the turtle and myself, and the fact that my head was under water so it was quiet made the whole experience very serene. It kind of felt like it wasn't real. I remember at one point really focusing my eyes on his/her face and thinking to myself "Wow, that's so life-like!" But then I remembered that it was real,  if I really wanted to I could swim down and touch it! We didn't do that of course, nor did we harass Crush  in any way at all (I named him/her Crush after the sea turtle in Finding Nemo;). For one, they are an endangered species, for another it just wouldn't have felt right. He was so peaceful, and going about his business, and kind enough (anthropomorphizing here) to not swim away while we gawked, that it would have been rude to pro

BF and a sea turtle (dark shadow)

d him even though for some reason I did want to touch him.
Eventually he grew tired of us, (or he had to catch his breath, and didn't want to surface next to us weird and goggle adorned creatures) and so he swam away, and we didn't follow. And the truth is we couldn't have even if we wanted to. We were no match for what a lifetime in the water had prepared him for, and he disappeared into the shadows in a matter of seconds.
Later on still we saw a turtle swimming back and forth along the shore, and we were able to see it cruising by while we waded in the water. I really had the sense that they were everywhere! With the beach and the palm trees and sea turtles everywhere it was so...tropical!
As it turned out that was the only day we saw any turtles. Everyday for the rest of the trip I looked out, but didn't see one. I was a little bummed not to see any more, but at the same time so content and grateful for the experience I did have, that I didn't feel to badly about it. My experience is seared into my memory, and I was able to focus on the details of it and enjoy the experience fully while it was happening, so I can recall it and enjoy it again whenever I want. What a great experience!
It was #1 in my list of things I wanted to do in Hawaii, and a great first day to my vacation!

Evolutionary Psychology

One of the many books I have been concurrently reading is called The Moral Animal by Robert Wright. And I have to say that out of all the books I've read recently, this one is by far the best. And by the best I mean that my mind is blown every few pages. I've spent a couple hours actually reading it, and several days contemplating the implications the author asserts. I'm only half way done, but it's so compelling that I thought I'd write about the subject now, and maybe post some thoughts about the content again later.
The book is a summary of the history of, and current research being conducted, in the rather adolescent field of evolutionary psychology.
This new branch of science is, in and of itself, a fascinating concept. Where psychology is the study of human thought and emotion, evolutionary psychology is the inquiry into why we have thoughts and feelings in the first place, and how hundreds of thousands of years of evolution has shaped our interpretation of a moral self.
The biggest insight to me has been the kinds of questions that evolutionary psychology asks. It addresses questions that most of us have probably never even considered. For example. Pornography (I just finished reading the section on this so I'll use it as an example since it's freshest in my mind). Everyone knows it's more of a "guy" thing than a girl thing. (I'm not stereotyping, it's been documented.)  But evolutionary psychology asks why don't women feel the same way about it? It asks why does it take an entire romance novel to convince a woman of the same feelings that a Playboy centerfold can produce in a guy in two seconds? The end result is the same (sex) but the road to get there is totally different. It goes further to ask the question why do men  become physically...agitated by a two dimensional image of a naked woman, but not compelled into fatherhood by a similar image of a baby? Likewise a woman can see a naked man on paper and not be impressed at all, but will resort to making kissy faces at an ad for diapers with a cute baby smiling on the page (again, not stereotyping, it's documented).
Aren't those interesting questions?  I mean there has to be something to it, because you don't see pubescent boys locking themselves in their bedrooms and fantasizing about being dad's, or teenage girls aspiring to be porn stars.
It's amazing to me to realize that I've overlooked so many weird things we humans to because they are "normal" for us. But when you step back, and approach our humanity with a more critical eye, you begin to notice disparities in our actions that our own intellect can detect once properly focused. Like I said before, mind blowing!
OK, that's all for now but stay tuned for more!

Meet Braylon

My fish Braylon Edwards.

I finally got a pet! What I wanted was a border collie, but what I got was a fish. Not that I am complaining, fish are great. My last fish, Dennis (who has now become my olive tree Dennis) was pretty great. Anyway this time I opted for a Beta Fish. They are less maintenance, and best of all they fit in my wine bottle. Before you get all upset, and start shouting fish abuse, you should know that the wine bottle is HUGE, (the size of three regular ones), AND that he seems to really like it in there.
Anyway, for no reason that would qualify as "good" I named him Braylon Edwards. For those of you that don't know, the original Braylon is a wide receiver in the NFL, and was just recently traded to the San Francisco 49ers. Other than that I don't know much about him (meaning the guy). But you know how sometimes you just look at an animal, or maybe even a baby, and a name just jumps out at you? Well, when I saw my Beta at the bet store the name that popped into my head was Braylon Edwards, so I went with it.

A Beta Fish, painting by me.

I've had him a couple weeks now, and he is a pretty good fish. I got him the best food they had at the pet store (blood worms...eeeewwww) and he seems to dig them. He looks awesome on my kitchen table, and likes to see what's going on. He will follow me around his bottle when I am at the table. He has become a bit of a beggar though. When I'm eating breakfast or dinner he swims back and forth on my side of his bottle and stares at me with his little fishy eyes pleading for a snack. I try not to give in, but it's tough. Anyway next time you are over, don't forget to say hi to him!

Starvation, Stress, and Fetal Development

I have been listening to a really interesting (and somewhat confusing) lecture series on human behavioral biology and have really enjoyed it so far. Out of all the interesting and unbelievable things I am now becoming acquainted with, there was one that I thought I'd share here. In a lecture called "Behavioral Genetics I" I learned about the pre-natal environment, and the lasting effects that things like stress and diet (of the mother) can have on a fetus while still in utero. Even though both stress and metabolic problems (or whatever you want to call them) are often passed from generation to generation (for about 3-4 generations being the average) neither is a genetic trait, i.e. they are not transferred to the offspring through DNA. These are examples of non-Mendelian inheritance, or non-genetic inheritance. They are circumstantially transferred from mother to fetus (and through subsequent generations) through some specific situation or as a result of some outside influence. I find that totally fascinating!
The following paragraph comes from a study on people who lived through the Dutch Hunger Winter in 1944.
For example, I guess it's during the third trimester that a fetus develops its metabolic pace, I guess you could say. That is to say it is during the last trimester when the fetus sort of (metaphorically) takes stock of how often and how much nutrition they are getting from mom and they adjust their metabolism, (which remains fixed ever after for the rest of their life) to most efficiently absorb calories. The staggering affect of this is that if the mother is starving, or otherwise not eating properly, or overexercising (so her body needs more calories than she is giving to her baby) then the fetus develops a very thrifty metabolism that can eek every last drop out of its caloric intake. If the mother eats normally, then the fetus develops a metabolism that is more normal, i.e. doesn't try to hold on to every calorie that enters the body. What that translates to down the road (in western society mostly) is that in the first case, there is a very high chance that the fetus will be obese, and will develop diabetes later in life, because it's body is tuned to absorb every last calorie, and once they are introduced to a western diet McDonald's and ice cream, their body can't process it normally. In developing nations this is actually adaptive because starving mothers there are more likely to raise their kids in an environment where there is little food and they need that frugal metabolism to survive.
It's just really incredible to think that during that 3 month window, way back when, inside mom, the amount of nutrients she consumed while the fetus was developing, could have lasting effects like her offspring having a lifetime battle against obesity.
Likewise, stress in the mother during pregnancy can alter the amount of stress hormones produced by her fetus and lead to things like depression and increased susceptibility to stress later in life. It basically works like this; mom gets stressed, she releases glucocorticoids into her blood stream. The fetus then absorbs them and as a result, develops a smaller than average brain, thinner cortex, which in turn makes it harder for the fetus to produce the hormones that block glucocorticoids (i.e. they can't turn off the stress response, after the stressful situation has ended). This leads to depression, anxiety, etc, And when the offspring get pregnant (years later) the cycle continues through the next generation.
So I guess the moral of the story is if you get pregnant, eat a lot of (healthy) food and whatever you do DON'T FREAK OUT!

I guess I should note that there are some scientists out there who disagree with the conclusions reached above. There were other studies conducted that produced different results. However from what I've read, it seems the differences are due to inconsistent controls from experiment to experiment. (For example, a similar study was done on Russian babies, and the results showed no correlation between mothers starving and obesity of fetus later in life, but in the Russian case the study covered the average of all babies (not just the ones in the last trimester), and the fluctuation in food supply was much more gradual than in the Dutch Hunger Winter study.)

Holy Cow!

I found this article (and this amazing photo) while cruising the internet the other day. I didn't realize cows could be so dexterous! LOL! Who needs horses? For the full article please visit the original site!

What a Bee Sees

Dandelion 

I came across an interesting fact while listening to science lectures on the Internet last week, and I thought it was cool enough to pass along here.
Pollinating insects, like bees, see colors differently than we humans do. They are able to see beyond what we call the visible spectrum, into the shorter ultraviolet wavelengths. While that's interesting it's not really all that fascinating until you couple that fact with the next one I am going to pass along.
It turns out that beyond the "normal" colors we humans see, many flowers have patterns and colors that are only visible in the ultraviolet. And most of the color in the ultraviolet creates a "bulls eye" around the center of the flower where the reproductive parts and pollen are located.

Crocus

I am not sure whether flowers evolved this coloration to attract pollinators or whether the pollinators developed the ability to see the color to find food, but either way one influenced the other to the point of shaping it's evolutionary history! The discovery of such relationships are like finding two pieces of a puzzle and putting them together. It's not the whole picture of evolution, but you still get that "Ah ha!" feeling when the two pieces fit perfectly together. Insights like these are amazing examples of the often weird interconnectedness that all living things have with each other. Life is something isn't it? And knowing that I am a part of this puzzle, that I exist in a world that has such things as invisible colors, it just makes me feel....freaking awesome!
(all photos borrowed from www.naturfotograf.com)

Primrose

Of Wolves and Men: An Idea

I just read an article about the controversy surrounding the wolves that live in the West. It appears they were on the endangered species list, then off it, and are now back on again. The reason their "endangered" prefix has been re-instituted is because ranchers are killing them off again, the same as they did at the beginning of the 20th century. And they are doing it for the same reason. The wolves prey upon their livestock.
The article went on to say that wolf populations in the Great Lakes area are faring much better, and that the many reasons range from an overpopulation of white tail deer to more tolerant "educated" city folk who think saving wolves is cool.
So what it boils down to is that in the West the ranchers don't like wolves because they eat their livestock. Other than that I don't think they have a problem with wolves just roaming around.
So here is my ingenious (or just regular genius) idea.Find an inexpensive way to tag the cows (or maybe just the leader of the herd) with a device that emits a high frequency whistle that would frighten the wolves away but not be perceptible to the cows! 
Dogs hear in the range of 64-4500 Hz, cows hear between 23-2500 Hz, so it should be possible to have the frequency up around 4000 Hz that would work. It could even be a chip of some sort implanted in the cow (if they were inexpensive enough to produce) or maybe a collar that one or two of dominant members of  the heard would wear. Doesn't that sound like a good idea? Wolves would find other things to eat, and ranchers would be happy.
Or maybe the better way to go (in terms of expense) would be to tag the wolves with really low frequency transmitters that would alert the cows but not interfere with the wolves. If the cows were warned, and the wolves rarely successful, then maybe they would start hunting their natural prey. What do you think? Or do you have a better idea?

Holeyfin

I was hoping to spread my book reviews out a little, but I am already three titles behind, so I thought I'd rather catch up all at once and have my facts straight rather than wait and forget.
I read somewhere that dolphins, along with chimpanzees, where the smartest animals besides us. So I went searching for a book about dolphins. I ended up getting To Touch a Wild Dolphin by Rachel Smolker.
While the book was a quick read, and not poorly written, I didn't care for it much in that it was more of a memoir of the author, and less about the actual data and research I was looking for. It was a good story, and had I been just wanting "something to read" in general, I probably would have appreciated it more. The other problem I saw with the book is that much of the data and methods of collecting data appear to me to be very outdated and so I am not sure how accurate the information I learned really is.
But I thought I'd pass around a few highlights/ interesting observations the author made while studying dolphins at Monkey Mia on the west coast of Australia. I am choosing facts that I don't think have changed with more recent observations.

• Dolphins evolved from a land animal (as did whales). They most likely belong to the group of mammals referred to as ungulates (cows, camels, deer etc).
  
• Their terrestrial origin is the reason why their tails are horizontal and flip up and down vertically through the water, as opposed to fish where they flip side to side.
• Dolphins are the only mammals who breath consciously. If for some reason they are rendered unconscious they will drown.
• Dolphins don't "sleep" or go into REM, so theoretically they don't dream. They do have the ability to rest one side of their brain at a time though which is their equivalent of sleep.
• Dolphins can plan ahead, (example: dolphin wants to fight another dolphin ( for what else? a female) but is outnumbered. He will go get his "pals" and then come back).
• Dolphins can use simple tools. They employ sponges and shells to do tasks.
• Baby dolphins nurse for up to four years!
• Dolphins have names for themselves. (unique whistle calls)

If anyone knows of, or has read any good books on dolphins that would maybe focus more on their intelligence, and the methods used to discern it, please let me know! It's really fun to think about the possibilities of being able some day to communicate with dolphins the way we can communicate with chimpanzees now. Can you imagine what they could tell us about the ocean?

P.S. Holeyfin was the matriarch dolphin at Monkey Mia. She was named such because she had a hole in her dorsal fin.

Crabs and The Missionary Position

I finished reading a really good book called Beautiful Swimmers (I have mentioned it in a previous post) while sitting pool side in Las Vegas last weekend. And before it all disappears into the recesses of my mind I thought I'd write about it.
I don't know why but for some reason I find crustacean mating rituals really interesting. I am not sure if it's because I never really thought about it before (so it's all new to me), or if through my own anthropomorphic tendencies I think it's really romantic. But anyway I think it's really cool, and I know I say this a lot but totally amazing!

Blue crab females only mate once in their lives, and they can only do it when they have just molted. Timing is everything because within 12 hours of the molt the shell of the female is already hardened too much to allow copulation to occur. Somehow the males know when the the females are going to begin their molt, and woo them before they begin to shed. The normal rigmarole ensues with the female accepting or declining her suitor. Once she has chosen she assumes a friendly posture and the male stands up on his tippy-toes and pulls the female under him and holds her with his walking legs creating a little "cage" around her. This is called the precopulatory embrace (isn't that just the sweetest sounding thing?). The male does this not to keep the female in, but to protect her from other crabs and fish while she sheds her old shell. He stands guard while she, sheltered from predators, wiggles out of her old shell. Once she's done, the male flips her over so they are stomach to stomach, she exposes her gonophores (openings that receive sperm) and he uses his gonopods to deliver the it. This can take anywhere from 5 to 12 hours.
Then the male flips the female back around and faces her forward and he continues to cradle and protect her until her shell is fully hardened and she is no longer vulnerable. This takes about two or so days. After that they go their separate ways, and the next spring their babies are born. It may not last forever, but isn't that about the most romantic thing you've ever heard? Chivalry may be dead in humans, but I am happy to report it's alive and well in the sex lives of blue crabs.


P.S. When I wrote the title it took me a minute to realize the subject of this blog could be seriously misinterpreted from just glancing at the name. But I decided to leave it because I think it's funny even though it was by accident.

Bravo Little Worm

I was reading a book about something totally unrelated to earthworms, yet, that's just what it got me thinking of. Maybe it's because the sidewalk in front of my house is strewn with the crispy corpses of the little guys who didn't make it back to the soil after the last rain.
Anyway, just when I thought worms were about as primitive and boring as a thing could be,I stumble upon something remarkable about them.
Everyone has at some point or another has chopped a worm in half. Whether it be by accident while gardening, or more malicious in nature (i.e. you want to watch them squirm), it is pretty likely you can form in your mind a picture of what happens.
The two pieces of the worm start wiggling around frantically...or do they? I have done a little looking on line, and I have discovered while the tail end wiggles a lot,the head end usually doesn't. The reason for this is because there is some sort of chemical that is produced in the head area of worms which suppresses the action of wiggling. When the head part is separated from the tail the chemical suppressant is no longer able to inhibit the natural writhing motion, and so it convulses.

Isn't that interesting? What's even more interesting is why a worm might have evolved such a chemical in the first place. And if you think about why that might be of great use to a worm, suddenly this odd quality borders on genius. The fact of the matter is a worm head can grow a new tail, but a severed tail cannot grow a new head. So if you cut a worm in half you don't get two new worms. You get one shorter (but will probably live) worm, and one dead tail. Now think about what would happen if say you were a worm that was unfortunate enough to get caught by a bird, and you were snapped in half to be consumed in two bites. At that point you must face facts and wave goodbye to your tail, there is no helping it. But your head part could continue on living (and reproduce) if you could only get away. And what better decoy (or distraction) for a predator than a (now useless) tail jumping and thrashing about? It draws the attention away from the still viable head part of the worm, so it has, at least a small chance of escape! Ingenious I say.
Bravo little worm.
Remarkable isn't it that such an apparently simple animal could have developed such a solution to a problem? Well, maybe the worms didn't develop the strategy, but natural selection did, through the worm.
I have always been the kind of girl who saves worms from puddles, and hot sidewalks, I just never realized how cool a thing I was saving.