History and Philosophy (often of Science)
jlynch | May 3, 2006No Se Nada highlights (and RPM picks it up) a picture of a statue of Louis Agassiz head-first in the ground after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. All very well. The piece goes on to say:
In response, David Starr Jordon [sic] - Stanford first president, a renowned scientist in his own right, and a frequent sparring partner of Agassiz's on the Darwin/evolution question said, "I always knew he was very fine in the abstract, but he's no good in the concrete."
Unfortunately, David Starr Jordan did not say this. It was a certain "Dr Argyll" who expressed a preference for Agassiz in the abstract…
jlynch | April 23, 2006
In February, I introduced a Sun Catfish (Horabagrus brachysoma) into my tank. Since then, he's probably grown about three-quarters of an inch in length. The species is a member of the the catfish family Bagridae, a widely distributed and speciose (some 30 genera, 210 species) taxon. Bagrids have four pairs of well-developed barbels surrounding their mouth and adipose fins of variable size. While scale-less, they are protected by a spine in front of their dorsal and pectoral fins. "Sun catfish" is an aquarist name; to scientists the species is commonly known as Günther's catfish after…
jlynch | February 23, 2006My post on the Darwin photo was picked up by Nick at the Panda's Thumb. Yesterday, I contacted Kevin Repp, Curator of Modern European Books and Manuscripts at the Beinecke and I received this reply today:
Many thanks for your query. As it turns out, the photo in question is indeed of Mr. Princep. How it came to be cataloged as one of Darwin is a mystery. The inscription business makes it all the more curious. In any case, I have alerted our digital library cataloging staff, and the record will be corrected promptly. Thanks again for pointing this out to us.
Mystery solved ... well sort…
jlynch | February 21, 2006
Above is not (see comments) a picture of Charles Darwin, taken obviously in his later years. He commented that "I like this photograph much better than any other which has been taken of me." The original is in the Beinecke Library at Yale.
jlynch | February 13, 2006As promised yesterday here [PDF, 1.2M] is the text of a talk I gave in 2002 to celebrate Darwin Day.
jlynch | February 12, 2006From the Autobiography:
Therefore my success as a man of science, whatever this may have amounted to, has been determined, as far as I can judge, by complex and diversified mental qualities and conditions. Of these, the most important have been - the love of science - unbounded patience in long reflecting over any subject - industry in observing and collecting facts - and a fair share of invention as well as of common sense. With such moderate abilities as I possess, it is truly surprising that I should have influenced to a considerable extent the belief of scientific men on some…
jlynch | February 12, 2006 I was going to post the text of a talk ("The Myths of Darwinism") that I gave to the Humanist Society of Greater Phoenix in February 2002. But I can't find a scanned copy. I should be able to post it tomorrow, though. So, in place of that, I give you ...
"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."
jlynch | January 12, 2006There is a nice piece in The New Republic (Jan 16th, unfortunately not online) titled "A Reason For Everything" in which Alan Wolfe reviews Rodney Stark's book The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism, and Western Success (Random, 2005; Amazon). Stark is a sociologist (rather than an historian) at Baylor University, and has previously written such works as For The Glory of God: How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery (Princeton, 2003; Amazon), One True God: Historical Consequences of Monotheism (Princeton, 2001; Amazon) and…
sb admin | January 10, 2006So what do you see? A groove and some lines? Truth be told, this is possibly the oldest recorded chordate fossil (or, should I say, one of a number of seventeen specimens of same). It dates from the pre-Cambrian - i.e. before 543 million years ago - during a period known as the Ediacarian. Found by Ross Faraghar seven years ago in the Flinders Range of Australia, the specimens represent our earliest view of chordate evolution, that is, the evolution of the group that we belong to (along with a few squishy things, and the more familiar fish, amphibians, reptiles, and mammals). Unfortunately,…