Jing-reed's Musings from Thailand

The Center of All Things

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. . .  and a more lyrical view of the same concept by that poet/astronomer Carl Sagan:

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Beautiful Minds: The Enigma of Genius

From the World Science Festival.

Immanuel Kant, who coined the term genius in the 1700s, defined it as the rare capacity to independently understand concepts that would normally have to be taught by another person. Since then, the spectrum of abilities that we call genius has widened, but pivotal questions remain: What exactly is genius? Where do the remarkable abilities of genius come from? Is genius something that lives within all of us, or is it a categorically different way of seeing the world that is bestowed upon only a few?

 

With the emergence of new imaging technologies and a fundamental shift in the understanding of how information is spread through our brains, we’re beginning to find some answers. We joined neuroscientists, psychologists, renowned thinkers, and special performers as they untangled the complicated nature of genius, creativity, and exceptionality.

 

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New Human Species ?

Mysterious Chinese Fossils May Be New Human Species

"Mysterious fossils of what may be a previously unknown type of human have been uncovered in caves in China, ones that possess a highly unusual mix of bygone and modern human features, scientists reveal.

Surprisingly, the fossils are only between 11,500 and 14,500 years old. That means they would have shared the landscape with modern humans when China's earliest farmers were first appearing.

"These new fossils might be of a previously unknown species, one that survived until the very end of the ice age around 11,000 years ago," said researcher Darren Curnoe, a palaeoanthropologist at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

"Alternatively, they might represent a very early and previously unknown migration of modern humans out of Africa, a population who may not have contributed genetically to living people," Curnoe added.  . . . "

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All the Time in the World

All the Time in the World  [Rachel Sussman]

"What a charred ancient tree can teach us about impermanence, deep time, and our place in the universe.

The tree had been on fire for over a week before anyone noticed. The Senator, one of the oldest Cypress trees in the world, was killed when a smoldering ignition from an errant lightning strike slowly transformed it into a towering chimney and fuel source in one. Or maybe it didn’t happen like that at all. Perhaps it was an errant cigarette, or a sinister match strategically placed in its hollow berth. The mystery endures, but the fact remains: on January 16, 2012 The Senator collapsed and died, engulfed in flames. It was 3,500 years old. . . . ."

Rachel Sussman Photographs

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The Wings of Wasps and Fruit Flies

Forget butterflies – wasps and flies have hidden rainbows in their wings

"The wing of a fruit fly, viewed against a white background, looks very ordinary. It is transparent, with no obvious colours except for some small brownish spots. But looks can be deceptive. If you put the wing in front of a black background, it suddenly explodes in a kaleidoscope of colour. Oranges, blues, greens, violets – virtually the entire rainbow dances across the wing, except for red.

A French scientist called Claude Charles Goureau first noticed these vivid hues back in 1843. Since then, they have languished in obscurity, “apparently unnoticed by contemporary biologists”. Whenever new species of wasps or flies are described, their discoverers almost never mention the coloured patterns of the wings. The visible pigments have even been described as “evolution in black and white”. It’s like walking through an art gallery with a blindfold.

Now, Ekaterina Shevtsova from Lund University has taken off the blind. By photographing several species against dark backgrounds, she has revealed a world of hidden colour, rivalling that of more obviously beautiful insects. “The claim that fly and wasp wing patterns are no match for the incredible diversity of colourful butterfly wing patterns is obsolete,” she says.

Shevtsova found that different species have their own unique patterns of swirls, spots and stripes, all shining with resplendent colour. The insects probably use their wings as billboards to communicate with one another and to distinguish between different species. Insect scientists can use the patterns for the same purpose, separating species that otherwise look identical.

Shevtsova has also worked out how the patterns are created. They are “structural colours”. They exist not because of any pigment, but because of the wing’s microscopic structures. When light hits the wing, most of it passes straight through but 20% bounces back. Some reflects off the top layer, and the rest reflects off the bottom layer after passing through the thin membrane.

The two reflected beams reinforce one another to produce a strong vivid colour. The hue that you see depends on how thick the wing is at a given point. By varying the thickness of the membrane, the insect can reflect a rainbow from its wings. This phenomenon, known as “thin film interference”, also produces the colourful patterns of oil on water. . . . . "

The 'Housecat' Croc - Fruitachampsa callisoni

The Jurassic’s Housecat Croc

"At long last, Fruitachampsa lives. Sort of. This strange crocodyliform has been extinct for around 150 million years. But, after three decades of waiting, this short-snouted croc has finally been officially named.

The new paper that describes Fruitachampsa callisoni calls the animal “A new shartegosuchid crocodyliform from the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation of western Colorado.” That’s “new” in a relative sense. Between 1975 and 1979, George Callison and James Clark discovered remains from multiple individuals of this croc near Grand Junction, Colorado. This animal was not like the alligators, caimans, gharials, and crocodiles we know today. (In technical terms, all those living lineages are crocodylians – a remaining portion of the larger and more varied group called Crocodyliformes to which Fruitachampsa also belonged.) Informally referred to as the “Fruita Form” in publications for years, this roughly three-foot-long archosaur had slender legs, a short skull, and rows of flat teeth with wrinkled, horizontal cusps socketed behind a small set of pointed teeth at the front of the jaws. As Jurassic expert John Foster dubbed the animal in his book Jurassic West, Fruitachampsa was “the house cat of the Morrison Formation.”

. . .But how did Fruitachampsa make a living? This Jurassic croc clearly was not an aquatic ambush predator. Fruitachampsa was a relatively slender animal adapted for a life on the land, but the more precise details of what it ate and how it behaved are unknown. Especially perplexing are those flat-topped teeth which Fruitachampsa shares with other shartegosuchids – what kind of food could such a tooth be suited to? Lizards, mammals, and even baby dinosaurs might have been suitable prey, but no one knows for sure. Hopefully, now that Fruitachampsa has a name, paleontologists can begin studying the natural history of the Jurassic’s housecat croc."

Meet Your Evolutionary Vegetarian Cousin

"In 1959 paleontologist Mary Leakey pulled a bone fragment from a gully in Tanzania. The find turned out to be one small piece of Paranthropus boisei, an evolutionary cousin who went extinct some 1.5 million years ago. His strong jaw, flat molars, and bony spine on top of the skull led paleontologists to believe he ate nuts and seeds, earning him the nickname Nutcracker Man.

But last May, University of Utah geochemist Thure Cerling revealed that P. boisei had unexpected dining habits. Analyzing carbon isotopes from the tooth enamel of 22 P. boisei individuals, Cerling found traces not of nuts but mostly grasses and grasslike plants. About 80 percent of their food came from the fields, where they grazed alongside gazelles, horses, and elephants.

That diet is markedly different from those of other primates. Chimps and gorillas find their food in forests. Direct human ancestors ate plants and meat. “It’s long been thought that primate digestive physiology was not that adaptable, but clearly grass was an available resource and P. boisei took advantage of it,” Cerling says. “Even though it’s no longer around, P. boisei’s line lasted half a million years—twice as long as modern humans
so far.”

Christopher Hitchens 1949 – 2011

Christopher Hitchens memoir to be published in January  [The Guardian]

"There is no-one like Christopher Hitchens. He was the most brilliant and versatile non-fiction writer of modern times, whose prodigious output was of stunningly high quality, a showcase for his vast range, deep knowledge and fierce wit. When he was diagnosed with cancer, he faced it with characteristic honesty, courage and rigour," said Mundy. "He is, quite simply, irreplaceable."

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Darwin vs Adam & Eve

Short video which is concise,well presented and pleasant to the eye and ear and mind.

And surprise, surprise, evolutiion is based on verifiable scientific facts.

The story of Adam and Eve, was just that, a story.  And it wasn't even original with those authors of the Jewish Bible, but rather plagerized and reworked from the earlier 'Epic of Gilgamesh', the Sumerian/Mespotamian creation story.

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Feathered Dinosaurs

Microraptor – the four-winged dinosaur that ate birds

:"We now know that birds evolved from small, feathered dinosaurs. It’s easy to think that since birds are still around today, they must have come after their dinosaur* cousins, but that’s not true. In the Cretaceous period, dinosaurs were still around while their descendants flitted through the skies. And some dinosaurs made meals of their flighty relatives. Jingmai O’Connor from the Chinese Academy of Sciences has uncovered the remains of a small dinosaur called Microraptor that has the bones of small bird in its gut.

O’Connor analysed the fossil with Xing Xu, a Chinese scientist who has made a career from discovering beautiful feathered dinosaurs. Microraptor is one of his most important finds. This tiny animal, about the size of a pigeon, had four wings, with long feathers on both of its legs as well as its arms. It was, at the very least, a very competent glider, if not a true flier.

The specimen that O’Connor and Xu have studied isn’t the best preserved Microraptor around. However, it does clearly have the remains of a small bird in its gut, including the left wing and both feet. There aren’t enough bones to tell which species it was, but the distinctive shape of its leg bone singles it out as one of the  enantiornithines, an extinct group of early birds. They were, after all, one of the most common groups of birds in the  forests of China, where Microraptor hunted. , , , , "


Equally amazing is that someone by the name of 'Jingmai O’Connor' is a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
But she does indeed exist, and here is her home page: