Science on the Edge

I thought that this article that appeared on the news page of the journal Science was an appropriate follow-up to my previous post. Bradley Byrne, a candidate running for the position of Governor of the great state of Alabama, is vehemently denying that he believes in Evolution after being "smeared" in a political ad that's been running for a few days now. The nerve! he responded by saying the following (among much more):

"As a Christian and as a public servant, I have never wavered in my belief that this world and everything in it is a masterpiece created by the hands of God," Byrne wrote. "As a member of the Alabama Board of Education, the record clearly shows that I fought to ensure the teaching of creationism in our school text books. Those who attack me have distorted, twisted and misrepresented my comments and are spewing utter lies to the people of this state." 
 
First, people need to get beyond the idea that somehow believing or not believing in evolution somehow affects his capability of running the state. Second, get in the real world - evolution is a "debate" (it's not really, we just have this inherent need to show two sides to an argument) between SCIENTISTS and crazy people...and since this is a "debate" about SCIENCE, the scientists win!

There isn't really much else to say...sometimes there is only the controversy we've created to seem fair and balanced. The evidence stands for itself...take away all the fossils, take away all the molecular genetic techniques, take away dating techniques, and there's still enough evidence to convince any rational person.

So, again, why should this even figure into a political campaign. The only way it should come in is to point out to the people that you are going to vote for someone who doesn't believe what is right in front of their face.

Just my opinion!

The brilliant man-genius behind xkcd brightened my day this morning with this lovely "comic", so I thought it would be only right to pass it on as it is relevant to the way we(well, not we as in Canadians, but oh well) think about science. Enjoy!

Anyone who has ever had to pick up pinecones and was violently poked in the process knows what a painful experience it can be. Instead of cursing to the heavens, you should blame dinosaurs for the pulsing pain in your hands or feet (I honestly don't even want to think about the excruciating experience of running barefoot and unwittingly stepping on a rogue pinecone).

While most modern conifers produce two distinct types of cones - slender male cones that house pollen, and bulky female cones which house seeds - most ancient cones were about the same size and shape. To answer why this situation might have arisen, Dr. Andrew Leslie of Yale University scoured the world's herbariums (like any good paleobotanist would) in search of fossilized cones. He measured the widths of 70 well-preserved specimens and compared them with the 200 or so living species of conifer. Unsurprisingly, his original observation stood up - female cones have indeed increased in size. But why?



To figure this out a number of factors had to be considered. First was what actually increased in size. Leslie found that it was actually the scales, which are used primarily for protective purposes, that increased dramatically in size. Second was when the shift in size happened. Interestingly, the shift seemed to begin right around the Jurassic period (199-145mya) when many of the largest herbivores (Diplodocus and Barapasaurus) walked the Earth. The long necks of these dinosaur species would have allowed them to graze much higher up on trees than an others before them, in turn putting female cones at risk.



While the pattern of the timing and physiologies of the cones are very striking, Leslie feels as though we shouldn't be so quick to discount small mammal and bird species that may have been inhabiting the upper canopies of these trees. The relatively poor recording of these species in the fossil record makes it a bit more difficult to figure out exactly what was going on in the trees themselves, but hopefully one day we will be able to figure this out!