The 12 Days of Books to Buy for Your Science Readers: On the Fourth Day of Book Lists…
Extraordinary Insects: Weird. Wonderful. Indispensable. The Ones Who Rule Our World. By Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson. 2018. Mudlark. ISBN-13: 978-0008316358
People assume we are the masters of the world, but in very real terms, we are relatively insignificant compared to the insects. If you’ve never really thought about insects more than as pests and thought the world would be better without them, read this book. Dr. Sverdrup-Thygeson will show you a world run by the tiny, how the insects have an essential role in ecosystems and your very life. Along the way, with humor and lavish images of the wonderful and bizarre, she introduces the staggering abundance and diversity of the insect world. This is not a entomological textbook. Rather, this is an introduction to a whole new world intertwined with the world we see every day, but pay little attention to normally. The hardback edition came out in 2018, but the Kindle version is now available and the paperback is due out next year.
Innumerable Insects: The Story of the Most Diverse and Myriad Animals on Earth by Michael S. Engel. 2018.
This book also deals with the insect world, but it does so in a very different way. Rather than get eye-striking photos of living insects, Dr. Ingel scoured the rare book collection of The American Museum of Natural History to find 300 years of insect research. He reproduces lithographs and illustrations from previous researchers and they are beautiful. Exquisite drawings such as these can often do a better job of showing anatomical detail than an image of the insect itself. While he discusses the insects and all the amazing thing about them, he tells the stories of the early entomologists as well. If you are interested in insects and are a history buff, you will like this book. Be warned, at 10″ by 9.3′ and 2.6 pounds, it is hefty, unless you buy the Kindle version.
Never Home Alone: From Microbes to Millipedes, Camel Crickets, and Honeybees, the Natural History of Where We Live by Rob Dunn. 2018. Basic Books. ISBN-13: 978-1541645769
When I first saw this book listed on Amazon, I was wondering how a natural history book would work as an audiobook (there is also a hardback, paperback, and Kindle version). Unlike the others on this list, Dr. Dunn tells his story mostly through the written word, with the illustrations much more sparse and definitely less essential to the book than the previous entries this week. But it is no less intriguing. This book discusses his and others’ research into the creatures that live all around us, living in our homes, mostly unseen. Even in a clean home, there are thousands of insects, microbes, and an array of other creatures. And that’s ok. They belong there. After reading his book, hopefully you will take from it that there is an amazing diversity of life all around you and that, for the most part, sustains a healthy life for you. So don’t panic about all the creepy crawlies, celebrate them as part of a thriving community we all share, because overzealous efforts to eradicate them actually make you sick.
Evolution Underground: Burrows, Bunkers, and the Marvelous Subterranean World Beneath our Feet by Anthony Martin. 2017. Pegasus Books. ISBN-13: 978-1681773124
Speaking of life that tends to go unseen, there is a world of life that lives under our feet. Animals live in the soil, crawling through it, making burrows, making their way through the blackness of caves, and generally living life underground. Most people know Dr. Martin for his work on dinosaurs, but he actually does more on ichnology, the study of tracks and traces. He spends his time studying the animals that leave their mark on and in the ground, whatever they may be. And there are a lot. Of course, there are the insects. Everyone is familiar with ant hills, but that is only the beginning. There are the clams and fish that dig into the beach sands, the beavers and other mammals that dig burrows, large animals like bears and giant ground sloths, and yes, even the occasional dinosaur. This book is written for a general audience, so like many of the others on this list, Martin does not just content himself with relaying the diverse nature living underground. He follows a pretty common trope in trying to make the research relatable through personal stories. He talks about his personal experiences. He doesn’t weigh it down by too much technical jargon. It makes the book an easy read and informative for the general reader. It is not a treatise for scholars, but a nice introduction to nonexperts to a world most people don’t think too much about.
I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life by Ed Yong. 2016. Ecco. ISBN-13: 978-0062368591
This one goes back a couple of years, but I think it is good enough to bear another mention. It is good to remember that we are not individuals, but walking ecosystems carrying, well, multitudes. As we are learning more and more these days, those other creatures are not mere passengers. They affect us in innumerable ways. They are essential for digestion, they change the way we interact with our environment. They even affect the way we think. Ed Yong is a gifted writer and he does a great job exploring the ways we are intimately connected with our environment and the way life in its many forms is intertwined. It has been said no man is an island. I am sure the person who first said that had no idea just how right they were.
Making Eden: How Plants Transformed a Barren Planet by David Beerling. 2019. Oxford University Press. ISBN-13: 978-0198798309
“Our brains are wired to notice animals, not plants,” says Dr. Beerling. Indeed we are. As one can see from the books I have discussed, I definitely fit into that myself. But without plants, animals would not be here. So I think it fitting that I end this particular list with a new book on plant evolution. I have tended to avoid plants because from the first botany class I took in college, it was clear to me they are far more complicated than animals. Anyone who has looked at plant genetics and reproduction knows that plants are hard. Fortunately, we have people like Dr. Beerling taking up the challenge of teasing apart the relationships and relaying it in a manner people like me can understand, for which I am grateful. The history of animal life is inextricably bound to the history of plants. Dr. Beerling does a good job of discussing the evolution of plants and how it has affected the evolution of animals, including us, and why understanding this connection is essential to our well-being as a species.
Come back tomorrow for a new set of books that focus on a singular species, humans.
The 12 Days of Books to Buy for Your Science Readers: On the Third Day of Book Lists…
This time I though I would move beyond dinosaurs to other animals. There is a whole, wide world of animals and here are a few books to help.
Turtles as Hopeful Monsters: Origins and Evolution by Oliver Rieppel. Life of the Past Series. 2017. Indiana University Press. ISBN: 978-0-253-02475-6
At one time, I would have said that if there was ever an animal that was mysterious enough to be aliens from another planet, turtles would be that animal. Understanding how they evolved their shells was a challenge. However, a lot of information has turned up in the last couple of decades that have helped elucidate the history and evolution of turtles. We know a lot more about them now and they are no longer that mysterious, but they are still fascinating animals. Few can match Dr. Rieppel’s expertise on turtles, making him a prime guide to all things chelonian. This book is not written as a technical treatise, but it isn’t for kids either. Rather, it is written for an informed general audience that is fascinated by the strange and wonderful stories about natural history. If this sounds like you, check this book out.
End of the Megafauna: The Fate of the World’s Hugest, Fiercest, and Strangest Animals by Ross D. E. MacPhee. 2018. W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN-13: 978-0393249293
Everyone knows about the Pleistocene Ice Age megafauna. Mammoths, giant ground sloths, saber-toothed tigers (Smilodons), armadillos the size of small cars, and rodents as big as bison. But the story of why they are no longer around is less well known. Were they wiped out by climate change? Were they hunted to extinction? Was it some of both? Was it something else? Don’t expect this book to give you a definitive answer, but it will give you an in depth discussion of what is known and unknown. Dr. McPhee has been studying this question for a long time and this book distills that experience into a readable and richly illustrated story for the rest of us.
The Rise of Marine Mammals: 50 Million Years of Evolution by Annalisa Berta. 2017. Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN-13: 978-1421423258
Dr. Berta has spent a lifetime studying the fossil record and evolution of marine mammals. She has written a book to share some of what she has learned and the wonder of these amazing creatures. I have a special fondness for whale evolution because of the great evolutionary story they represent and because one of the earliest known whales was found in my state, although few people know about it. This book will walk you through the history of whales and dolphins, sirenians (manatees and dugongs), seals and sea lions, and other lesser known aquatic mammals. If you enjoy watching the otters play at the zoo and ever wondered how mammals made the transition to aquatic organisms and if the otters might continue down that path, get this book.
Oceans of Kansas: A Natural History of the Western Interior Sea, Second Edition by Michael J. Everhart. 2017. Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-02632-3.
Mammals are not the only animals to have returned to the water. During the Cretaceous, an inland sea split the North American continent in two. If there were people around making maps at the time, they would have labeled this area “Here be monsters.” No one knows them better than Mike Everhart. The first edition came out in 2005 and huge amounts of information has been discovered since then. This new edition is bigger and more richly illustrated with more fossils and more information of their diets, behavior, and ecology. If you love mosasaurs, plesiosaurs, pliosaurs, and all the amazing marine reptiles that lived in the central United States, you will appreciate this book.
Snakes of Europe, North Africa and the Middle East: A Photographic Guide by Philippe Geniez. 2018.Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-17239-2.
The closest animals alive today to mosasaurs are the monitor lizards and snakes, so let’s finish up this list with a book on snakes. There are plenty of books on Snakes of North America, but it is harder to find good books on other places. This book is a great field guide covering the classical cradle of civilization and Europe. For all 122 snakes in the region, this book has detailed distribution maps, anatomy, ecology, phylogeny, and tons of other information on them. It even discusses the venom and its uses for the venomous ones. There are even lists by country, so you can easily find what snakes are present in any particular area. And did I mention photos? Lots and lots of photos. With this book handy, you should have no fear of running across a snake unprepared.
That’s it for this time. Come back tomorrow for more books. The next set will move away from vertebrates to the spineless ones and a book about plants.
The 12 Days of Books to Buy for Your Science Readers: On the Second Day of Book Lists…
The previous list covered several dinosaur books that were mostly for on the lighter side, or with flashy graphics. Today I want to cover some books that are a bit meatier on the text and less on the graphics (not that there’s anything wrong with graphic heavy books, they just serve a different purpose).
The Tyrannosaur Chronicles: The Biology of the Tyrant Dinosaurs by David Hone. 2016. Bloomsbury Sigma. ISBN-13: 978-1472911254
This book is the oldest on my lists, but it is still worth picking up if you haven’t already. Dr. Hone is a respected paleontologist working on the behavior and ecology of dinosaurs and pterosaurs. He is also a talented writer, which you can read on his blog, Archosaur Musings, and his articles in The Guardian. This book may be getting a bit long in the tooth, but it is still the best book out there focusing on tyrannosaurs. This book is not for those just getting into dinosaurs. It is not for your general reader who thinks T. rex is cool. This book is for dino enthusiasts who have read about dinosaurs and are looking to add some serious scientific meat to those bones, but are not quite ready to hit the primary literature themselves, preferring an expert to distill and collate the information into a cohesive package.
Why Dinosaurs Matter by Ken Lacovara. 2017. Simon & Schuster/TED Books. ISBN-13: 978-1501120107
Dr. Ken Lacovara is justifiably famous for his research on the Patagonian South American giants of the dinosaur world, including one of the largest ever found, Dreadnoughtus, which while not the longest, ranks as one the the heaviest terrestrial animals that ever lived. He has been studying dinosaurs a long time. Lacovara has written a nice little book explaining why studying dinosaurs is more than just academic interest, expanding on a TED talk he gave in 2017. The introductory chapter in the defense of dinosaurs is worth the price of the book all by itself. But don’t stop there. He does a great job discussing the amazing animals dinosaurs are and why it is important to our understanding of the natural world and what we ourselves might be capable of. These animals pushed the boundaries of what is biologically possible. Understanding how and what the true constraints are matters as we ourselves push those boundaries in other ways.
The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs: A New History of a Lost World by Steve Brusatte. 2018.
Dr. Brusatte has made a name for himself studying dinosaurs holistically as a group more so than particular species or type. He is particularly fond of the more grandiose ideas of origins and extinctions, beginnings and endings. As such, it is only natural that his latest book covers just that, how dinosaurs began as minor players in the Triassic ecosystem through their rise to dominance in the Jurassic and their inevitable crash at the end of the Cretaceous. Even with their crash and loss of most of the large animal niches, they still are the most diverse vertebrates on the planet other than fish, but there is no denying their heyday is over. Brusatte serves as a good tour guide of the history of dinosaurs in their prime, when they ruled the land with a bloody tooth and claw. Of course, this book is about more than dinosaurs. It is about him as well. The book could be a journal of the places he has gone and the people he has seen. So if you are wanting to learn about Brusatte and his study of dinosaurs, this is the book. If you want to just cut to the chase and learn about dinosaurs, maybe try a different book. It all depends on how much you want to read about dinosaurs and how much you want to read about those who study them.
The Ascent of Birds: How Modern Science is Revealing Their Story by John Reilly. 2018. Pelagic Press. ISBN 978-1-78427-169-5
I said earlier the dinosaur heyday is over. Ornithologists like Dr. John Reilly would probably disagree. While Brusatte dealt with nonavian dinosaurs, Reilly provides a great walk through of living dinosaurs and the stories that make them fascinating objects of study. Starting with the Tinamou and Vegavis, he works his way through the birds to finish with White-eyes and Tanagers. Along the way, he uses their stories to discuss numerous concepts of evolution and ecology. If you are interested in how evolution works and you have a particular love of birds, this is a great book. Essentially, this is a book discussing evolution, using birds for all the examples. Considering their staggering diversity and accessibility, the opportunity to see them, I can’t think of a better group to use for this purpose.
Dinosaurs―The Grand Tour, Second Edition: Everything Worth Knowing About Dinosaurs from Aardonyx to Zuniceratops by Kieron Pim. 2019. Second Edition. The Experiment. ISBN-13: 978-1615195190
I debated whether or not I should include this book. I hate books that claim to tell the reader what is worth knowing and what isn’t. It is an exceptionally arrogant title. Pim is not a paleontologist, so he does not have the cachet the other writers on this list have, so the book really does not deserve the title. The first edition was put out in 2014. If you have that one, I would not recommend getting this one. This one is better, but I am not sure it is enough better to justify buying it again. The cover artwork, while wonderfully done, is not really indicative of the artwork in the book, which are more line drawings than what is seen on the cover. The artwork also has some inaccuracies that bug me, such as enormous overbites that hide the lower teeth and put the upper teeth covering the entire lower jaw, which are all too popular among artists drawing dinosaurs. Nevertheless, the artwork in this edition is a step above that of the first, with more colorful and interesting art for this edition. The book is also more of an encyclopedic organization, a dictionary of dinosaurs, rather than a cohesive and in depth examination. All of which puts this book in a definitely different category than the others. However, if you are looking for a book to flip through and learn about some interesting new dinosaurs, you may find this book worth your time, or at least, an interesting gift for a young (although not too young as at almost 10″ tall and over 2 pounds, or 1 kg, it is not a small book) person into dinosaurs.
That’s it for today. Come back Monday for a set of books on other prehistoric animals.
The 12 Days of Books to Buy for Your Science Readers: On the First Day of Book Lists…
It has been a long time since I have written anything for Paleoearie. I have not given up or abandoned the site. I just had to take a sabbatical. I apologize for leaving the site fallow for so long. But, for now at least, I am back and hope to be putting out more stuff soon. If all goes well, I will continue to be adding new stuff to the site on a regular basis.
To celebrate my return to Paleoaerie, I thought I would start with a series for the holidays. Between now and Christmas, I will present to you 12 days of book recommendations for your science friends or just to put under your own tree as a present to yourself. So without further adieu, I present to you, on the first day of book lists, dinosaurs, because of course.
Extreme Dinosaurs Part 2: The Projects by Luis Rey. 2019. Imagine Publishing. ISBN-13: 978-0993386626
Luis Rey is one of my favorite dinosaur artists of all time. His work is always imaginative. He brings dinosaurs to vivid, colorful life better than anyone in the business. Luis also spends countless hours studying fossils and talking to experts to get the science right and then goes the extra step to push the boundaries to provide something beyond the ordinary. Mark Witton, a fabulous artist and respected paleontologist in his own right, has written a thorough review of the book here. I will simply say that if I was buying just one book this year about dinosaurs, this would be it.
The Story of the Dinosaurs in 25 Discoveries: Amazing Fossils and the People Who Found Them by Donald Prothero. Columbia University Press, 2019. ISBN: 9780231186025
Dr. Prothero is a renowned paleontologist who has written a number of interesting and thoughtful books for the general public. His latest book covers the history of dinosaur research through the stories of 25 discoveries, discussing how the fossils advanced the study of dinosaurs, as well as the people who worked on them. This book shows how the science evolved through both scientific discovery and the human element behind it. It should make a great read for someone just getting into dinosaur paleontology as a science and beyond the “T. rex is cool!” phase (don’t get me wrong, they are undeniably cool, but there is so much more beyond that). Covering fossils from the first Megalosaurus find to Sinosauropteryx, you will find the favorites here in their historical context, as well as more recent fossils that had a major impact. This should give your budding paleontologist a thorough grounding to begin their quest in earnest.
The Dinosaurs Rediscovered: The Scientific Revolution in Paleontology by Michael Benton. Thames and Hudson, 2019. ISBN-13: 978-0500052006
If your dino enthusiast is up to speed with the major finds, it is time to get into the real meat of the science. Dr. Benton is a titan in the field of dinosaur paleontology, publishing prolifically and overseeing the work of numerous other workers. His latest book gives a nonspecialist a great introduction to what the science of dinosaur paleontology is up to these days. While many people think of paleontologists spending their lives in the field digging up dinosaurs bones, that is only the first step in a long road to discovery. To truly understand what the fossils can tell us, that requires intensive work in the lab and there is none better than Michael Benton to lead you through the lab and show you all the wonderful things that can be learned, what we are learning, and what things are still to learn.
Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Life: The Definitive Visual Guide to Prehistoric Animals. Smithsonian Series. DK Press, 2019. ISBN-13: 978-1465482495
Dinosaurs are certainly the most famous prehistoric creatures, but they are far from the only ones. DK Press has put out numerous fascinating books on prehistoric animals, but my favorite has to be their Smithsonian Series. The books are meticulously researched and are packed with amazing graphics and stunning pictures of real fossils. This book appears to be a revamped and updated version of their Prehistoric Life: The Definitive Visual History of Life on Earth, which came out in 2009, which, if you have seen that book, it is a tome, guaranteed to fill many hours with wonder and awe. This book is clearly more focused on dinosaurs than the previous book, but it does not skimp on other animals. So if you want a book that gives you tons of dinosaurs, but also puts them in their place among the history of animals, this is a book for you. Of course, if all you want is dinosaurs, then try DK’s Dinosaurs: A Visual Encyclopedia. The 2nd edition came out in 2018.
Totally Amazing Facts About Dinosaurs (Mind Benders Series) by Matthew Wedel. Capstone Press, 2018. ISBN-13: 978-1543529302
The last book I want to discuss today is a book that came out last year written by Dr. Matt Wedel. Wedel is a paleontologist specializing in the biggest of the big. He studies sauropods, those giant, long-necked dinosaurs, and all things huge and terrestrial. One might even say he is a big kid who matured, but never grew up. As such, he is a great person to write a book for kids. He can bring that child-like sense of fun and wonder while at the same time having the experience and breadth of knowledge to really know what he is talking about. If you have a kid who is still in the “dinosaurs are cool” stage, but is not ready for the detailed science, this is the book for you.
That’s it for today. Tune in Friday for The Second Day of Book Lists, when I will bring you..more dinosaurs!
National Online Learning Day
September 15 is National Online Learning Day. Now that everyone should be well and truly back to school, I thought it would be a good time for a few miscellaneous notes on various resources.
Online Courses
Evolution: A Course for Educators. American Museum of Natural History via Coursera. Learn about evolution from an expert at one of the best places in the world to study it. Taught by Dr. Joel Cracraft, the course will cover everything you need to teach evolution well. The course is free and offers a paid certificate for teacher professional development hours. It is four weeks long and requires 5-8 a week. It begins October 1st, so you will be done by Halloween.
Introduction to Human Evolution. Wellesley College via edX. A subject that is endlessly fascinating, but seldom taught in schools. Learn about the origins of us from an expert. Taught by Dr. Adam Van Arsdale, the course is self paced, meaning you can start when you want. It takes 4-6 hours for four weeks and is free.
Paleontology: Theropod Dinosaurs and the Origin of Birds. University of Alberta via Coursera. A five week course headed by the esteemed dinosaur expert Dr. Phillip Currie on the anatomy, diversity, and evolution of theropods leading to birds. They offer a paid certificate for those needing the credit. Expect to spend 4-7 hours a week on the course. The course is free, but it started September 12, so join up now before you get too far behind.
Paleontology: Early Vertebrate Evolution. University of Alberta via Coursera. This course covers the evolution of vertebrates through the Paleozoic Era and is taught by Dr. Alison Murray. This is a four week course with an expected 3-5 hours per week. This course is free, but offers a paid certificate for those who need the credit. This course also started September 12th, so sign up now.
Dinosaur Ecosystems. University of Hong Kong via edX. A six week course on dinosaurs in their habitats. The course is taught by a collaboration of Dr. Michael Pittman and Dr. Xu Xing, along with other guests, all with an abundance of expertise on the topic. As a bonus, the course includes the work of one of my favorite paleoartists, Julius Csotonyi. The course requires 1-2 hours a week, so not a big time commitment. It is free, although it does offer a paid certificate for those who need the credit, and starts October 4th.
Dino 101: Dinosaur Paleobiology. University of Alberta via Coursera. Another course by Phil Currie, along with Dr. Betsy Kruk. This is a great introduction to dinosaurs. It is 12 weeks long and requires an estimated 3-10 hours per week, so expect more out of this course. The course is free and starts September 29th, so get signed up now.
Origins – Formation of the Universe, Solar System, Earth and Life. University of Copenhagen via Coursera. Learn how it all began by Dr. Henning Haack. This course is 12 weeks long and expects 5-7 hours a week. The course is free and starts September 17th, so don’t waste time signing up.
There are several more available. If you go to any of the course links shown here, they will guide you to other related courses that are available.
Websites
Tetrapod Zoology. Darren Naish has kept his blog, often abbreviated to TetZoo, for over a decade. Through all the years, he has provided multitudinous essays on a variety of animal groups, both extant and extinct. Sprinkled in are also essays on the truth of cryptids (Bigfoot, Nessie, and the like), paleoart, and other topics. Sadly, the blog at Scientific American has closed up shop. But don’t panic, because it has moved to another location. He has set up shop under his own banner at Tetzoo.com. Time to change your bookmarks.
Beautiful Minds. Scott Barry Kaufman has been writing a Scientific American blog about psychology off and on. He recently announced an upgrade to the blog allowing him to have a weekly online column, so expect more articles about human nature from him.
Science Sushi by Christie Wilcox has always been one of my favorite blogs. While I am not a marine biologist by any stretch, she has always been interesting to read. So it is sad to report her Discover blog is closing up shop. She is moving to ScienceSushi.com, but will not be adding regularly to it. She will continuing to write, so keep an eye out for her on the sites she lists in the post linked to here.
Dataset Search. You’ve heard of Google Search, Google Scholar, Google Maps, and a plethora of other ways Google lets people search the web. Now meet Dataset Search, for when you are trying to find data that has been published or stored online. This searches for data files or databases according to how they are identified, not by what is in the file.
Science without publication paywalls: cOAlition S for the realization of full and immediate Open Access, by Marc Shiltz. PLoS Biology. 2018. This article discusses Plan S, a proposal by a coalition of European leaders to make science articles free for everyone. In their words, “no science should be locked behind paywalls!” (emphasis theirs).
Seriously, Science? A great blog on Discovermagazine.com that covered weird and humorous published research has been canceled. No word on why, the authors just said they were informed they would no longer have a slot on the blog roll. So long, Seriously Science, it was good to have known you.
Books
Return to Reason: The Science of Thought, by Scientific American. 2018. This ebook is a collection of essays discussing why facts don’t seem to matter to people or help persuade them and what we can do about it. Well worth a read.
Timefulness: How Thinking Like a Geologist Can Help Save the World, by Marcia Bjornerud. Princeton University Press. 2018. Most people can barely remember what they had for breakfast yesterday. We really aren’t well equipped to think about time on the scale of millions and billions of years. Dr. Bjornerud has written a great book to help people come to grips with the immensity of time. I highly recommend it.
Underbug: An Obsessive Tale of Termites and Technology, by Lisa Margonelli, Scientific American/Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018. This book is not really about termites. The study of termites is used as an illustration of scientific inquiry and the questions that researchers come across during their studies. There are questions about the termites, but also about how science is done and about humans viewed through a different lens.
Darwin and the Making of Sexual Selection, by Evelleen Richards. University of Chicago Press. 2017. This book tells the story of how Darwin figured out problems with natural selection by coming up with sexual selection. To my mind, sexual selection is a subset of natural selection, but it is generally viewed as separate, with natural selection being success based on fecundity and survival of offspring, whereas sexual selection deals with the choices of mates. However you look at it, sexual selection is an important concept and this book explores the origin of that idea.
The Dinosaur Artist: Obsession, Betrayal, and the Quest for Earth’s Ultimate Trophy, by Paige Williams. Hachette, 2018. Williams tells the story about a skeleton of a Tarbosaurus bataar, what could be described as a Mongolian Tyrannosaurus rex, and the long and confusing battle of who owned it and where it would eventually reside. The worldwide fossil trade is a morass of differing opinions, laws, and money. This book attempts to tease apart the strands to answer the question of who owns fossils.
Through a Glass Brightly: Using Science to See Our Species as We Really Are, by David P. Barash. Oxford University Press, 2018. As the great physicist Richard Feynman said, “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself–and you are the easiest person to fool.” Humans are masters of deluding ourselves, but science helps us remove the wool we place over our eyes to see things, and ourselves, as we truly are. Only then can we become the people we see ourselves as. That is the goal of evolutionary biologist Dr. Barash in this book.
The Book of Why: The New Science of Cause and Effect, by Judea Pearl and Dana McKenzie. Basic Books, 2018. A big problem that any educator sees is the rather unbelievable lack of understanding many people have about cause and effect. Please get this book and teach people about how cause and effect works. Since this book relates the science of cause and effect to robots and artificial intelligence, it will be the perfect addition to tech classes.
I think that is enough for now. It is certainly enough to keep you busy if you try even a few of the many offerings available for furthering your education or just indulging your curiosity. Enjoy. If you try them, come back and let us know what you thought of them.
Why We Need To Understand Evolution (and why we need a natural history museum)
With all that has been going on in the world and all the important societal problems, I have been despairing that my desire to push for a natural history museum and more evolution education seemed not as important. But it struck me today that it is perhaps one of the most important things we need to do. There are a lot of misunderstandings about evolution, even among people who accept it, that hinder our ability to get along in the world. Understanding two important truths of evolution will go a long way towards healing our societal divides. What are those truths? 1. We are all the same, and that is a good thing. 2. We are all different, and that is also a good thing. These may seem contradictory, but if you understand how they are meant, they make perfect sense.
- We are all the same, and that is a good thing.
When you start really studying life on this planet, it quickly becomes inescapable that we are all connected. We are all part of the same family. Strip off the skin from humans and we see essentially the same underneath. We all share the same skeletons, our muscles and organs are the same, there are no important differences in our brains. Sure, there are differences, but no matter what way we try to divide humans, especially by skin color or nationality, we find that the differences within the groups are greater than the differences between groups. What this means is that the dividing lines are arbitrary and have no biological basis.
When we go beyond humans and look at all vertebrates, we see the same thing. If we compare skeletons, we see the same bones over and over again. Every animal that has four limbs shares the same bone structure. They may look different, but the bones are all the same. All of our front limbs have a humerus, an ulna, and a radius. We all have the same number of fingers and toes. They may look different, they may lose some as they grow from fetus to adult, but they are all there. As we get farther and farther away from direct ancestry and relationships, the superficial differences start piling up, but the core is always the same.
Going even farther, we all share the same base code. We all use essentially the same DNA and RNA. The sequences may be different, but just as all computer programs are different, they all share the same underlying coding language. We all share metabolic pathways, from bacteria to humans.
Why do we see all these similarities? Because we all share an ancestor. Somewhere down the line, we are all related. We are one family. It may be a very extended family, but we are all together. All life on Earth is connected. Through that life, we are all connected to the very rock upon which we stand. Life has shaped the surface of the Earth. It has shaped the air we breath. We all sprang from the same roots. When you look at someone from a different culture, someone with a different skin color, you are not seeing an other, you are seeing a long separated family member. Embrace that connectedness. Now, I know that no one can get more under your skin and angry than a close family member, but at the end of the day, we don’t generally let that tear us apart. No matter how much we may disagree with our family, we still recognize they are family. Just take that feeling and extend it to recognize that every living thing on Earth is also part of your family.
2. We are all different, and that is a good thing.
So if we are all essentially the same, how can we all be different? No matter how closely we are related to someone, there are always differences. Even identical twins are not completely identical. Our DNA and life experiences mean that each and every one of us is different in some way from everyone else. While we all share the same basic body plan and organization, there are always some differences.
Those differences are important. Ask any agricultural scientist and they will tell you that one of, if not the biggest danger in our food supply is the monoculture crops we grow. When everything is the same, that means they also share all the same limitations and vulnerabilities. Monocultures only work when there is no change. But they do not handle change well. And if there is one thing we know about life, it is that change is inevitable. These days, we are pushing change faster than ever before, so this vulnerability to change is deadly.
Purity is the death of a species. We need diversity to weather changes. As new diseases crop up, as weather becomes more unpredictable and changeable, we will need the diversity to be able to handle whatever is thrown at us. The more diverse the population, the more changes we can tolerate. In a diverse population, there will always be some fraction of the population that is prepared for anything that happens. Those people will make sure that we continue. Moreover, they will help those of us unprepared for the changes make it through. When a new disease appears, those that are naturally immune will be key to developing medicines that will allow the rest of us to survive. Those that can handle climatic changes will be the ones to build the structures and infrastructure that will allow the rest of us to weather the storms. We need diversity. If we try to homogenize our culture and our people, we will die.
We need evolution education and a natural history museum.
So how do we get people to understand this? First of all, on a broad scale, we need to teach people a proper understanding of evolution and evolutionary theory. But we have to do it in a way that exemplifies its importance in our everyday lives. We need to get people to understand why they need to understand it. Evolutionary theory affects us every day. People need to understand how.
We need natural history museums for a multitude of reasons, but two very important ones apply here. First, they will stand as storage houses of information. They are a public recording of the changes that have taken place and are taking place. Secondly, they are a way to teach people who are not in school. Even if they don’t pay that much attention to the details in the museum, they will see a record of the changes. Museums can be designed to showcase the importance of evolution, the advantages of diversity, and the dangers of reducing that diversity. Museums are one of the most trusted sources of information. We need to leverage that to showcase both the interconnectedness of life on Earth and its diversity and why that has allowed its continued existence. It also can showcase what happens when that diversity is not there.
One may argue that history museums would be better at this. The advantage of history museums is that it makes it personal and easy to make it easy for people to relate to it. The disadvantage is that it makes it personal and easy for people to get defensive about it. Natural history museums can teach these lessons on a canvas that people can view and learn from more dispassionately, without it feeling like a personal assault upon their culture that can often happen in history museums.
To be sure, many people will feel that any mention of evolution is an assault upon their worldview, so I am not advocating the idea the natural history museums are inherently better. Instead, I am advocating the view that all types of museums work better when there is a diversity of museums that can tell the stories from different angles. Without a natural history museum, we lack an important viewpoint in the public arena. By building a museum network, we can spread the ideas much more effectively. A natural history museum will not hurt other local museums. It will help all of them. We don’t need just a natural history museum. We need a natural history museum, a local history museum, an international history and cultural museum, an art museum, and other museums. In Arkansas, we have some of the history, art, and culture, but we do not have a natural history museum. As such, we lack that long and broad view that can only come from an understanding of natural history.
What’s wrong with bunny hands on dinosaurs?
I was reading a post by Brian Switek on his blog Laelops—which by the way, if you aren’t reading it, you should—about interpreting injuries on dinosaur bones. It’s an interesting read, but what caught my eye was a problem that I have seen in more places than I can count. He included this picture in his post. Take at look at the front limbs.
Plateosaurus. Credit: Brian Switek
The “hands” are pointed inwards. To get in this position, the elbows have to be turned outwards, using a rotation in the shoulders. But it also requires the hands to be pronated. To get what I mean by that, hold your hands forward with the palms up. When you do this, the two bones in your forearms—the ulna and the radius—are positioned side by side.
This position is called supination. Pronation requires the radius to rotate so that it crosses over the ulna. This can be done because of the construction of the elbow. The ulna is essentially the entire elbow joint, making it a hinge type joint. The radius is, for the most part, just along for the ride at the elbow. The head—the part at the elbow—is round, with a shallow indentation, which is surrounded by what is called the annular ligament. That ligament wraps around the radius, attaching it to the ulna, but never actually attaching to the radius itself, allowing the head to spin in the sling. It is that shape of the radius and the annular ligament that allows it to rotate freely, which makes our level of pronation possible.
Importantly, all tetrapods have the same bones. It was set in place from the first fish that developed bones to support their fins and remains that way all through the hundreds of millions of years to us today. However, not all animals have the same shape of the radial head. Some animals appear to not have both bones, but in reality, they do. They have just fused the bones together. But that fusion has consequences, just like altering the shape of the radial head.
Before we move on to dinosaurs and those consequences, it would be reasonable to ask about other animals to see if they show the same pattern. Let’s take a look at proboscideans, the family of elephants. They are large animals that have their palms facing downward.
This is an elephant skeleton on display at the Manchester Museum. They have a radius and ulna, just like humans. Theirs, however, do not swivel. Nevertheless, it is rotated so that the bones are not in parallel, but the two ends are twisted so that the radius is twisted over the ulna. Their forelimbs are in permanent pronation.
So what about dinosaurs? Let’s look at Dreadnaughtus, the giant sauropod.
This is Figure 2 from Lacovara et al. 2014. The radius and ulna are massive, as befits a giant quadruped. They are also incapable of rotating to pronate the foot. It has been said by some that some degree of pronation is required for efficient quadrupedal locomotion, but that is not really accurate. It does mean though, that the first digit, what would be our thumb, is going to face forward or at most slightly inward while the remaining digits will be angled outward (anterolaterally). They will not be situated directly forward without shifting the arms at the shoulder. As an example, here is a figure showing a sauropod trackway. Note the direction of the toes.
This is a figure from Falkingham, et al. 2010. As can be seen, the toes are not forward, but pointing outward. The level of pronation is minor and can be achieved with only rotation at the shoulder and a minimal shift or the forelimb. VanBuren and Bonnan (2013) found this was true in all quadrupedal dinosaurs.
This is a best case for pronation in dinosaurs and they can’t do the full pronation needed for bunny hands, much less the bizarre inward facing hands of the Plateosaurus above. So let’s look at theropods, where we see bunny hands all the time. For instance, in Jurassic Park pretty much all the dinosaurs have bunny hands.
The palms are downward with the arms close in, requiring a full pronation to achieve that position. So could they do it? To the bones. This is the radius of Neuquenraptor, as published by Novas and Pol in 2005. It is an unenlagiin, in the family Dromaeosauridae, along with Velociraptor, Deinonychus, and all those other raptor dinosaurs.
These radius is fairly straight, and if you look at the head, it is not the shallowly indented round cup we see in mammals. It is more angular, which is typical of theropods. That relative angularity would prevent the radius from rotating as ours do, in effect locking it into a small range of motion, preventing them from placing their hands palm down.
In point of fact, VanBuren and Bonnan didn’t just look at sauropods. They looked at all types of dinosaurs. They found that no dinosaur had the ability to cross the radius over the ulna, which means that at best, they had very limited ability to pronate their forearms. That means no known dinosaur could have characteristically held their arms close in with their palms facing downward, aka bunny hands.
It is a little more complicated than this. Studies have shown that if the arm is fully extended, the hands can be more pronated, by using the entire length of the arm to rotate, but even that is not going to be fully pronated like we can, or bunnies can. And if you think about the living dinosaurs, the birds, when was the last time you saw a bird put its wings flat on the ground in front of them? They can clap, but they can’t type or play basketball.
Of course, the wrist bones of the maniraptors—those dinosaurs leading up to birds—did have what is called a semilunate carpal bone, allowing them to move their hands to insane degrees side to side, which is what allowed them to develop the ability to fold their wings like they do, and they can flex and extend their hands to a remarkable degree. But they cannot rotate their wrist. Try it yourself. See what movements you can make with your hand without moving your forearm, just your hand. However far you can move your hand that way, these dinosaurs have you beat in spades. But once you move that forearm, you have a serious advantage over them.
Cabinets of Curiosities at the Old State House
Back in the old days, before the idea of museums being educational centers became commonplace, most museums were more like some rich person’s trinkets collected during vacations packed into glass cases so people could see them. They rarely had signs telling people what anything was, nor was there oftentimes any attempt at organization. Because of the rather haphazard and all-encompassing nature of the displays, they got the name Cabinets of Curiosities.
As time went on, they became more thoughtful and organized, with more attention being spent on telling people what the objects were, teaching people about them, and properly preserving the objects for posterity.
The Old State House Museum in Little Rock honors that tradition with an exhibit called “Cabinets of Curiosities: Treasure of the University of Arkansas Museum Collection.” I am sad to say that the exhibit has been up since March 11 of 2017, but I have only recently learned about it and have gone to see it. Truth be told, the only reason I found out about it was because I went to the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville to see the Hazen Mammoth fossils and found that the lower jaw of that mammoth was on display in Little Rock.
The reason I am sad to say this is because the exhibit is well worth your time to go see. If I had known about it earlier, I would definitely have discussed it here by now. I was told it will still be at the museum for another year, so you still have time. It is free, so go. Spend a Saturday downtown and explore the exhibit. Then go see what else is down there, which is plenty to keep you busy over the weekend.
What will you see when you are there? To begin with, you might want to ask directions from their helpful and friendly staff, because the exhibit is upstairs in a side gallery that you might miss if you didn’t know it was there.
The objects are from the University of Arkansas Museum at Fayetteville, which, sadly, closed its doors in 2003. As a result, if you want to see their collections, you have to make an appointment to see the warehoused collections. Or you can see a small part of them in this exhibit. The museum had collections from all over the world covering many subjects, which the exhibit honors by having selections of a wide range. It is like a mini-museum of anthropology and natural history.
I am a fossil guy, so I am going to focus on the fossils you can see. The fossils are mostly in the first two rooms that you enter in the exhibit. In the first room, under the horns of a large cervid (the family containing deer, elk, and moose), are two cabinets of invertebrate fossils and minerals. There are some nice fossils to see. You can see a crinoid with the calyx, or body, and pinnules, or “fronds”. These are much rarer than the pieces of stalks we normally find throughout the Ozarks. There is also a starfish, ammonoids, and nice plant fossils, among others.
To the right of this display is a cabinet containing the skulls of a musk ox and Smilodon (saber-toothed tiger), a couple of large, straight-shelled nautiloids, and one of the bones of Arkansaurus, which up until very recently, was the only known dinosaur found in Arkansas.
On the other side of the room, you can see the bones of an elephant leg and a cabinet full of geology specimens, including one enormous quartz crystal that would not be allowed as a carry-on for some planes because it is too big to fit.
The next room contains case with the leg bones of a camel, lion, dog, and cat. It also contains the pieces of mammoth that I came to see. But before you get to that case, you have to pass a giant clam that could fit a child, or even a small adult if they curled up.
The other side of the room contains the skulls of a bison and rhino, a whale rib, and an entire icthyosaur from Germany. The end of the room has the skulls of a bear and walrus, complete with tusks, and the skeletons of a bat and snake.
The final part of the fossil and biology section that I was most interested in was an old display of horse evolution. If made today, it would probably look substantially different because of all the new data we have gotten since that display was made; but except for a few very minor details, the essential facts would be the same.
Of course, there is much more to the exhibit than what I have presented here, such as this cool whalebone armor and cavalry sword, so spend some time checking out the rest of the exhibit and the museum.
There is one thing that the exhibit could have capitalized on, but didn’t (mainly because they didn’t know about it, but also because they were trying to stay with the whole cabinets of curiosity motif), was that many of the fossils and biology specimens have fossil counterparts that have been found in Arkansas. For instance, we have fossil Smilodons, musk oxen, whales, several mastodons, giant deer and giant snakes, and much more.
So here is my question to you. How many people would pay for a special tour of the exhibit that discussed all the cool Arkansas fossils that matched up with the ones on display here. How much would you pay? $10/person? More? Less?
The Geological Society of America meeting in Little Rock and new Arkansas Dinosaurs
On March 12-13, the south-central section of the Geological Society of America held their annual meeting in Little Rock, Arkansas. During that meeting, a session was held on paleontology in honor of Arkansaurus fridayi being named our State Dinosaur, even though it has never been officially scientifically named and it being the only dinosaur that has ever been found in Arkansas other than tracks. That all changed during the meeting. This post will focus on the Arkansas dinosaurs (yes, plural, that was not a typo). A later post will cover more fossil announcements.
The first talk on Arkansas dinosaurs came from our very own Dr. Rebecca Hunt-Foster, who did the initial work on Arkansaurus. She has a new paper that came out right after the meeting. She announced that Arkansaurus fridayi is now the officially recognized scientific name for our dinosaur. She also discussed her findings confirming it as an ornithomimid, one of the bird-mimics, like the Gallimimus made famous in Jurassic Park. That had been the first tentative identification, but her work previously showed that it did not match with other known North American ornithomimids. However, that was from a total known collection of nine specimens. We now have almost two dozen ornithomimids known from North America. When she compared Arkansaurus with the new material, she was able to confirm that the initial identification was indeed correct. Moreover, it showed that ornithomimids had the ability to disperse across the continent at the time. The Late Cretaceous interior seaway that bisected the continent had not yet closed off access by then.
Dr. Celina Suarez from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville provided the most astounding talk of the session (ed. this was a repeat of the talk she gave at the national GSA meeting in Seattle in 2017). We knew we had titanosaurs and acrocanthosaurs in Arkansas from their foot prints. Now we have their bones as well. She presented a description of the first known Mesozoic multi-faunal vertebrate assemblage in Arkansas. In other words, she reported a collection of fossils that contained several different species. The fossils were found in Howard County within the Holly Creek Formation, a part of the Trinity Group that underlies the DeQueen Limestone. This is the same site which became famous for its dinosaur tracks.
Among the fossils included pieces of a titanosaur that is probably Sauroposeidon, one of the largest dinosaurs ever known. They like to call it Paluxysaurus in Texas, but further work has indicated that Paluxysaurus is a junior synonym of Sauroposeidon found in Oklahoma and now Arkansas. She also found pieces of an Acrocanthosaurus. For those who are not familiar with this dinosaur, it is a carcharodontosaurid, the same family as Giganotosaurus. This family is within Allosauroidea, the group containing Allosaurus and all its kin. Acrocanthosaurus was almost the size of Tyrannosaurus rex and with a small sail or ridge along its back and was the dominant predator of its time.
Drawing of a Sauroposeidon proteles and an Acrocanthosaurus by Mike O’Brien.
That isn’t all though. They also found scutes from an ankylosaur. While it isn’t a lot, Kristy Morgan, one of her students, was able to determine that they likely belonged to a nodosaurid ankylosaur either most closely related to or actually was Borealopelta, a dinosaur from Canada just named in 2017 from the best preserved dinosaur fossil ever found.
Borealopelta markmitchelli. Image credit: Royal Tyrrell Museum.
Finally, pieces of two other theropods were found. They found pieces identified as Deinonychus antirropus, Velociraptor’s big cousin, as well as Richardoestia. Deinonychus is well known as the archetypal dromeosaur, the dinosaurs with the famed sickle-clawed toe. Richardoestia is much less well known, making this identification curious. All that is really known of this dinosaur is a set of jaws and some isolated teeth. Three species have been named, but at least one has been suggested to be a sebecid crocodylomorph. It is likely that once more of this genus is discovered, some or all of the species will not survive, at least as they are now. But for now, we will count it as an Arkansas dinosaur until shown otherwise.
Richardoestia. CURRIE, RIGBY & SLOAN, 1990
This just touches on the fossils found in this assemblage. We now have a much bigger glimpse into Cretaceous Arkansas. Stay tuned for more. For now, we can say that southwest Arkansas 120 million years ago looked something like this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueBM9QxebNsyoutube
What the Colombian fossil lizard fish has in common with the Arkansas saber-toothed herring
Three years ago, a ten year old boy was visiting a monastery in Colombia. Being a curious boy, he looked around at his surroundings. He could have done like others have done for centuries and not paid that much attention to the stones upon which he walked, but he didn’t. He noticed a curious fossil fish in one of the flagstones. Most people, if they noticed it at all, would have simply given it a passing nod of interest. He, on the other hand, took a picture of it and sent it to the local Paleontology Research Center to see if they knew what it was.
Firstly, I amazed they even had a local paleontology research center, most places don’t. Secondly, it is amazing that the boy took the time to bring it to their attention. Thirdly, it is amazing that someone there noticed what they had and brought it to the attention of the needed experts. All these amazing, unusual occurrences have resulted in an article in the January 31 edition of the Journal of Systematic Paleontology detailing the new fossil species discovered by that boy. Sadly, no one knows how to contact him to let him know about the publication. The researchers have his name and email, but have apparently been unable to contact him to give him his copy of the paper about his fish.
The fish he discovered was named Candelarhynchus padillai, after the Monastery of LaCandelaria near Ráquira, Colombia, where it was found. The stone for the flagstone came from a nearby quarry. According to the authors of the paper, the rocks in the quarry corresponding to the flagstones were “fossiliferous, finely laminated, light to dark grey, indurated mudstones ofthe lower-middle Tuonian San Rafael Formation…” The rock strata also contained numerous plankton, ammonites, clams, and crabs; so quite a rich fauna. The Turonian is 89.8-93.9 Mya, according to the latest GSA time scale, so we are talking roughly 92 Mya.
The fossil is excellently preserved, with slabs containing both part and counterpart, meaning that when they split the slab, pieces and impressions were left on both sides. The whole body can be seen, with nice detail around the head, as well as impressions of the soft tissue portions of the fins. At 27 cm (just over one foot), it is a decent-sized fish. It’s a thin fish, with a long skull full of tiny, conical teeth. It was clearly a fast-swimming predator, and likely prey for a lot of larger species.
The reports on the fish said that it does not have any living relatives. That is true, in a way, but also not. The specific family the phylogenetic analysis placed it in is Dercetidae, an extinct family that all died out in the Cretaceous. However, if we look a bit broader, it is in the Order Aulopiformes. This order is mostly known for a variety of mostly deep water fish known as lizard fishes, which is why all the news reports of this find have said Candelarynchus was a “lizard fish.” Even though it is in the same Order, it is not in the same family as any of the modern lizard fish.
But the title of this post mentioned Arkansas and I have thus far not done so. Vernygora reports that current analyses of fossil aulopiforms include three main families: the Dercetidae, Halecidae, and the Enchodontidae. One of the most prominent Cretaceous fish from Arkansas is Enchodus, commonly called the “saber-toothed herring.”
This is a terrible name because Enchodus has nothing to do with herrings. It was at one time considered part of Salmoniformes, making it closer to salmon. However, more recent analyses have consistently placed it in Aulopiformes, specifically within the Enchodontidae, making it closer to lizard fish. This makes a good deal of sense to me because, if you add the fangs from a payara, commonly known as the vampire fish, onto a lizard fish, you have pretty good idea of what Enchodus was like.
Payara. Image credit Exotic Fish Wiki
Fossil lizard fish then were quite abundant in the Late Cretaceous in both worldwide range and diversity. They may not be the most recognized fish today, but they have a long history and make for great fossils that can be found in a lot of places, including southwestern Arkansas.
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