Our bodies are bunches of atoms, and like any rock or star or other bunch of atoms, we have to obey the laws of physics as we move. But each species obeys those same laws in its own way. My cat leaps onto my desk most mornings, his grace unblemished by the paper clips and computer cables he kicks onto the floor. A maple tree outside bends in the wind, a happy medium between flopping over and snapping in two. A hawk arrives at the tree and lands precisely on a branch. On their own, our eyes cannot tell us much about the different ways in which living things move. We can’t see the invisible vortices of air spiraling behind a hawk, the stresses experienced by different parts of the leaning maple, the thrust and torque generated by my cat as he rises into the air.
Jennifer writes: “I’m not a scientist (exactly) but I am in the Navy, just like many of the men who visited the moon. My husband and son are space fanatics, the Goodnight Moon window is for my daughter. She loves the book.”
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Originally published January 23, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
Check out this scholarship for high school science teachers to learn tropical biology in Costa Rican jungles. Apply here. Get sweaty. Have a good time.
Originally published January 22, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
It’s been nine years since I published Parasite Rex, but it just got a very cool honor. Amazon has named it one of their highest-rated science books. The criteria are a little squirrely, but I won’t turn it down.
Originally published January 22, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.
Tyler Volk, an Earth scientist at New York University, recently wrote a book about climate change and carbon dioxide, called CO2 Rising. I spoke to him about the book in November on Bloggingheads, and he just sent me an email: “I’m on some sort of crazy goal to bring the C-cycle to everyone…I’ve started making some YouTube videos….(I wrote, filmed, acted, did graphics and sound, edited, and played music).”
I’ve embedded Tyler’s first two videos here. It may be a little rough around the edges, but the information’s great and Tyler is quite brave to roll around in leaves and then turn himself into part of a hand-drawn diagram of the carbon cycle. Consider it a garage-band science documentary. Or maybe an audition reel?