Birdwatching might be a casual activity, a hobby, an avocation, or even a profession (often, perhaps, an obsession) depending on the bird watcher, but there is always a science to it, in at least two ways. First, there is the science of how to do it. In this sense, the term “science” means something vernacular. We as easily say “birdwatching is an art” as we could say “there is a science to it” and here we are using both terms( “art” and “science”) in their older sense where science is how we approach things with our minds, and art is how we approach things with our hands.
Continue reading The Science of Birdwatching
Monthly Archives: June 2009
“Obama = Hitler”
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Massimo Pigliucci: “Politics, Philosophy and Atheism.”
Atheists Talk #0074, Sunday June 14, 2009
Is there a direct correlation between atheism and liberalism? Why do so many atheists lean towards the left of the political spectrum? Many of our past shows have focused on the Conservative Christian influence over American politics, but does that necessarily mean that one needs to oppose their views in all areas? Politics, philosophy and atheism are the topic for today’s show. Our guest is Massimo Pigliucci, who contacted us following our interview with Sunsara Taylor, because he wanted to address a few of the points she had made in regards to socialism and atheism. As a philosopher and an evolutionary biologist, Massimo regularly addresses the intersections of politics and religion. George Kane will lead the discussion.
Tomorrow, Sunday Morning on AM 950 Twin Cities, as via the internets. Details here.
Which is better, cats or dogs?
Dogs:
Cats:
Dogs:
Cats:
Microsoft ships IE7 without browser?
No, it is a typo by the BBC. The BBC RSS feed on this story:
No IE onboard Windows 7 in Europe
says, and I quote,
“Microsoft ships IE7 without browser”
Funny how the browser was integral and a drop dead feature when MS was being sued by Nestcape, and now it is something they can actually ship the OS without. Over and over again we see that the European courts are more sensible and in the anti-trust area powerful than the US courts.
European buyers of Windows 7 will have to download and install a web browser for themselves.
Bowing to European competition rules, Microsoft Windows 7 will ship without Internet Explorer.
I don’t like the phrase “bowing to the rules.” It implies that MS is being chivalrous by actually following the law.
Notes from the North Woods
Someone asked me at dinner “What time did you get up” and as I was trying to remember what time I woke up this morning, and kinda wondering why she was asking me that, my wife answered for me: “Noon.”
So I’m thinking “Why does Amanda think I woke up at noon. As a matter of fact, at noon, we were just arriving at the cabin up here …. oh … ” …brain kicks in … “we got up here a noon. Got it.”
At noon. We got Up. To The Lake. … It’s a Minnesota thing.
Today I heard about a maple tree that fell in half …. the top half fell off … because woodpeckers nested in it and overdid the nest building activity. What this misses is that a rotted tree (and this tree is rotted) has many hundreds of thousands of organisms distributed among hundreds of species, including fungi, bacteria, worms, insects, and so on, working on that woody material. The woodpeckers, being more visible, get blamed. How unfair to the woodpeckers.
The resident loons have two chicks. You could tell they have two chicks without seeing them because the territorial/warning call they give when they have chicks is distinctly different from the chick-free territorial/warning call. But from where I’m sitting right now, I can also simply look out the window and see the chicks, which are a the moment riding on mom/dad’s back. The chicks look no more than 48 hours old. I’m tempted to go over and look at the nest to see if there are any egg fragments, but I’m afraid of getting pecked to death by the loons. (Of course, they’ve probably abandoned the nest by now anyway). These loons did not produce young last year.
Caught and released innumerable bluegills this afternoon. Observed numerous painted turtles in the “lagoon,” and the bigger female turtles are pulling out all over the place to lay eggs. And, we are having a (light) lake fly hatch, and there is another cycle of tree frog lekking going on. A lot of K-strategy organisms are busily scarfing up the r-strategy outputs.
Today’s birds en route from the twin cities to Cass County, and the vicinity of Woman Lake:
- Bald Eagle (pair with two-year old and the two-year old)
- black capped chickadee
- blue jay
- brown cow bird
- Canada goose
- Common Golden eye
- common tern (a good one)
- common yellow throat
- crow
- grackle
- gray catbird
- great blue heron
- hairy woodpecker (breeding pair)
- loon (breeding pair)
- mallard (breeding pairs)
- nuthatch (heard)
- phoebe
- pileated woodpecker
- robin
- ruby throated hummingbird
- tree swallow
- trumpeter swan (pair)
- veery (heard)
- Whip-poor-will (heard)
- wood thrush
- yellow bellied sap sucker
Not a bad day for your basic casual birding! (Most of the more interesting sightings were Amanda’s. I was busy flipping fish out of the lake.)
Science Education: New Creationism and Law Web Page
The National Center for Science Education has a new web page, as part of their ever-improving and getting really quite wonderful web site, on Creationism and The Law. Here.
The End of the Line
Tune up your iPhone and trip out.
The Time Traveler’s Wife: Book Review
With the recent news about this book being made into a movie, I’m reposting my review of it.
The book is The Time Traveler’s Wife
SpecMapular I And the Bird Web Carnival!
A spectacular edition of the birdy blog carnival, I and the Bird (# 102) is up at The Birder’s Lounge. The carnival provides a map showing the approximate location of each bird discussed.
For the record, the following is a somewhat more accurate location for the birds in my post. The X is where the sighting sarted, and the circle is approximately where I saw the falcon last.
Do not adjust your television set.
Widespread panic and confusion has been predicted by major media outlets as all analog televisions in the United States stop working today.
Chronic Racial Discrimination Affects Health
The role of racial discrimination in mental health has been established in a number of studies, and a new study works out some of the details in how this works.
The study found blacks may, in general, have poorer mental health as a result of two mechanisms: First, chronic exposure to racial discrimination leads to more experiences of daily discrimination and, second, it also results in an accumulation of daily negative events across various domains of life, from family and friends to health and finances. The combination of these mechanisms, reports Anthony Ong, assistant professor of human development in the College of Human Ecology at Cornell, places blacks at greater risk for daily symptoms of depression, anxiety and negative moods.
“As a result, African-Americans experience high levels of chronic stress. And individuals who are exposed to more daily stress end up having fewer resources to cope with them,” said Ong.
The study, one of the first to look at the underlying mechanisms through which racial discrimination operates to affect the daily mental health of African-Americans, was conducted with Cornell graduate student Thomas Fuller-Rowell and Anthony Burrow, assistant professor of psychology at Loyola University-Chicago; it is published in the June issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (96:6).
Rachel Maddow: Growing Threats Against Women’s Centers
The new Right Wing values: Kill your enemy and then eat them.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy