Who says there aren’t any disagreements over human origins? Not this guy.
[hat tip the Twitterati]
Originally published October 29, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
I had the pleasure of serving as a judge for the Scientific Merit Award at the Imagine Science Film Festival, which just closed over the weekend. You may have seen the winner we picked, Magnetic Movie, which I’ve embedded below. There was a huge variety to choose from, some wonderfully beautiful, and some finding great emotional depth in just a few minutes. But Magnetic Movie, in the way it reveals the hidden weirdness that surrounds us, was tops.
Magnetic Movie from Semiconductor on Vimeo.
Originally published October 28, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
NOVA isn’t just a great television series; it’s also a formidable web site. (And, as with so many things media these days, it’s hard to draw the line between the two.)
They’ve just launched an evolution-rich site, with information on their evolution-related shows and lots of other goodies. (As you can see, it’s still beta.)
As part of the unveiling, NOVA asked me if I’d pick ten of the most important developments in evolutionary biology over the past decade. I came up with a far-from-exhaustive list. Check it out.
Originally published October 26, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
After weeks of manically scrubbing my hands with soap, Purel, and eye of newt, I ended up getting swine flu anyway. It’s not terribly surprising, since my entire town seems to have become a Petri dish for the viruses this week. I find a stunning clarity to the flu–you don’t feel a little sleep-deprived, or a little raspy. You are just a slave, heeding your body’s call to go to bed. I’m grateful that I am now on the mend, but I’m worried that with so many of us conking out, even a small percentage of serious cases will wreak havoc on hospitals. Someone please remind me why we still make our flu vaccines in chicken eggs?
Continue reading “Where I’ll Be Talking (Now That I’m Conscious)”
In my latest podcast, I talk to Hazel Barton, a microbiologist who explores the bizarre biology of microbes that live in deep caves. Check it out.
Originally published October 23, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.