Archive for category Science and Nature
Our Strange Universe Keeps Getting Stranger
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Science and Nature on December 28, 2008
Here’s yet another look at weird phenomena that scientists can’t explain. They’ll believe in anything, from aliens space-seeding to interdimensional wormholes. Just don’t mention the G-word!
The Song of the Sea
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Science and Nature on December 7, 2008
For years now, marine biologists have observed the “songs” of whales — seemingly musical compositions thought to communicate positions for migration or to attract mates. Now, however, researchers have discovered that sperm whales sing simply for the pleasure of singing.
It’s difficult to hear such reports without thinking of Perek Shira, the ode dating back, perhaps, as far as the great kings David and Solomon, that describes how the myriad creatures and creations that fill the universe sing the praises of the Almighty, each with its own unique voice.
Typically, we understand the “songs” of Perek Shira to mean that the variety and complexity of creation testifies to the handiwork of the Creator. But perhaps we are meant to understand a more literal meaning as well.
The sea giants say: Praise HaShem from the earth; sea giants and all [denizens of] the watery depths (Tehillim 148:7).
Growing to dimensions far beyond any inhabitants of the land, surviving depths that would crush human beings in an instant, these magnificent creatures awe and inspire us. But now we know that they do something more than that:
They sing.
Friday Flashback
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Science and Nature on November 27, 2008
Apparently, the legendary “rogue waves” of sailor lore are more than a just a myth, and can reach heights of 80 feet on the open sea. On October 28, one such wave swept over Boothbay Harbor, Maine. The 12 foot high wall of water would have caused catastophic damage, experts said, had it not struck at low tide.
But water, the source of all life and all blessing, has become increasingly a source of destruction. Hurricanes Katrina, Ike, and Gustav, not so long after the Pacific Rim Tsunami, suggest it’s time for another look at these reflections on our relationship with the world we live in.
If they can do it …
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Culture, Science and Nature on November 26, 2008
Live Science reports new findings that amoebas, the most fundamental form of micro-organisms, respond to environmental crises in a revolutionary way: cooperation and self-sacrifice:
Called Dictyostelium discoideum, this amoeba species generally keeps to itself when living in a healthy environment with [adequate sustanence].
But when food supplies run low, the free-living organisms clump together into a community of individuals. The result is a multi-cellular organism. Each amoeba takes on one of two roles in this organism: They either become spores, which can survive and reproduce, or they die and the dead cells form stalks that lift the spores above the ground to increase the chances the spores will disperse to more favorable environments.
It doesn’t reflect well upon human beings that we can’t take this simple lesson a step further than the most simple single-celled bacteria, or that sometimes we can’t even get as far as they do. With the economy plummetting, we hear to little “ask not what my country can do for me” and way too much “where’s mine?”
Jewish history provides endless examples. The world was destroyed in the Great Flood because a culture of greed and violence had spread over th face of the earth, and the Second Temple was destroyed because of the twin transgressions of senseless hatred and refusing to go beyond the letter of the law.
When research reveals that germs have more cooperative spirit and a greater predisposition toward self-sacrifice than we do, the echoes of history should warn us that even more troubles may be waiting around the corner.
Unless, or course, we take a sharp turn around a different corner.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Global Warming Debate
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Culture, Science and Nature on October 30, 2008
The first October snowfall in London since 1922 set the backdrop for a House of Commons debate over sweeping global warming legislation. But it’s probably just a coincidence.
Freedom to Think
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Culture, Politics, Science and Nature on October 24, 2008
It’s truly remarkable how a society that worships so passionately at the twin altars of political correctness and non-judgmentalism can indulge in such unabashed group-think and censorship of thought and speech.
I just saw Ben Stein’s extraordinary documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, which chronicles the attack by the mainstream scientific community — not against the concept of “intelligent design” but against allowing any debate whatsoever on the subject. Stein compellingly demonstrates how today’s amoral and intolerant culture of dogmatic Darwinism mirrors the Darwinian euginics movement that contributed to the rise of Nazi Germany.
I couldn’t help but draw a parallel with the mainstream media’s love affair with one presidential candidate and its unapologetic assault against the other. WSJ columnist Daniel Henninger shines the light of objectivity on the lopsided coverage (with special attention to SNL producer Lorne Michaels’s unsually candid comments), while Michelle Malkin makes a mockery of the media portrayal of Sarah Palin as a bumbler.
(One snippet: which VP candidate, in an interview with Katie Couric, praised FDR for his response to the stock market crash? Answer: it wasn’t the one in high heels. Oh, and FDR wasn’t president when the stock marked crashed in 1929. Bonus points if you know who was; you may also be qualified to run for high office.)
If one side has a 100,000 watt speaker system and the other side has a cardboard megaphone, where is free speech then? (This is actually the answer to those on the far right who accused John McCain of “trampling on the First Amendment” with his finance reform legislation.) And if those who try to speak out are ridiculed, censured, or otherwise browbeaten for their minority opinions, how long until even freedom of thought is disallowed.
Case in point: Joe the Plumber, who had the audacity to hope that he could get a straight answer to a fair question. Actually, the answer the candidate gave was straight. But the attack dogs that pounced on him afterwards are bound to discourage other questioners. On that point, I’ll give Jonah Goldberg the last word.
… except for this: here we have two striking examples of the culture war about which I’ve already written.
Hurricane Season
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Philosophy, Science and Nature on September 14, 2008
With Gustav and Ike causing so much havoc, and the memory of Katrina still painfully close, these thoughts on the Pacific Rim Tsunami may warrant another look.
Random nature?
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Science and Nature on August 18, 2008
I find this among the most compelling examples of evidence for “intelligent design.” Try to imagine the countless evolutionary factors that would have to crystallize simultaneously and with perfect synchronization to bring such a phenomenon into existence.
Left: Normal spider web set up to catch prey. Right: The cocoon web and wasp cocoon (Picture: Nature)
SPIDER “DRUGGED” BY PARASITIC WASP
A parasitic wasp has been found to ‘drug’ its spider host, inducing it to weave a special cocoon-like structure for the wasp’s own ends.
A report in the journal Nature [July 2001] describes how the female Hymenoepimecis wasp attacks the Plesiometa argyra spider at the hub of its orb, stings it into temporary paralysis and lays an egg on the spider’s abdomen which hatches into a larvae that grows by sucking the spider’s fluids.
“On the night that it will kill its host, the larva induces the spider to build a cocoon web, molts, kills and consumes the spider, and then spins its pupal cocoon hanging by a line form the cocoon web,” writes William G. Eberhard, of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. The cocoon web results from repetition of certain early stage orb weaving components, and repression of others [to] provide a stronger, more durable protection for the wasp pupae.
[Somehow, the larvae trigger an involuntary reflex in the spider’s brain that compels it to construct a redesigned web of four silk cables, strong enough to support the larval cocoon and perfectly suited to the wasp’s metamorphic needs.]
Eberhard investigated the activity and found that even when the larva is removed shortly before construction of the cocoon web would normally start, the spider was still put off course. He concludes that the mechanism employed by the larva to manipulate the spider’s behavior is manipulated by chemical rather than physical interference from the parasite.
Many parasites manipulate their host’s behavior, but most of them induce only simple changes, such as movement from one habitat to another, eating more or less, or sleeping. Hymenopimecis’ manipulation of its spider host, [Eberhard ] says, is probably the most finely directed alteration of behavior ever attributed to an insect parasitoid.
Anna Salleh (ABC Science Online)
JudaismOnline sees this as an allegory for the battle between the yeitzer hara and the yeitzer tov — our inclinations for good and for evil. Residing within each one of us is an ever-lurking attraction to material self-indulgence that perpetually tries to lead us into spiritual self-destruction by drugging our spiritual conscience and awareness into senselessness.
All beginnings are difficult…
Posted by Yonason Goldson in Science and Nature on July 30, 2008
What better way to begin than with Rashi’s famous comment to Sh’mos (Exodus) 19:5. At age 24 I had to learn aleph-beis, followed by talmudic grammar, syntax, and reasoning, followed by Jewish law and ritual, followed by how to articulate all of the above to others. Now it’s technology, and my mind is not nearly so resiliant at age … well, I’m a lot older than 24.
So, while I labor to get this blog up and running, here’s my latest post from elsewhere:
http://www.beyondbt.com/?p=1041
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