tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-63431980975458791672018-10-05T03:36:49.617+01:00The Beagle Project BlogPeter Mchttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03850862887931603954noreply@blogger.comBlogger662125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-15698453783276995452014-06-05T12:59:00.000+01:002014-06-05T12:59:25.447+01:00HMS Beagle Project at Seafair Haven 2014<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The HMS Beagle Trust has been in talks for several months with the new owner of the tall ship <i>Earl of Pembroke</i>, the medical company Metaco Ltd, and has secured her visit to Milford Haven for its biennial <a href="http://www.seafairhaven.org.uk/content.asp" target="_blank">Seafair Haven</a> classic ship festival from 7 to 14 June. The aim is to publicise the work of the Beagle Trust and its local educational partner the Pembrokeshire <a href="http://darwincentre.com/" target="_blank">Darwin Centre</a>.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves>false</w:TrackMoves> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing> <w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing> <w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery> <w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:DontAutofitConstrainedTables/> <w:DontVertAlignInTxbx/> </w:Compatibility> </w:WordDocument></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="276"> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language:EN-US;} </style><![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <!--EndFragment--><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The highlight will be the educational work with some 30 young people aboard the <i>Earl of Pembroke</i> in Milford Haven for a special outing on 11 June. On that day, the ship will join up with a research vessel from Dale Fort to capture plankton to be brought ashore and studied by the young people under the microscope later in the day. The session will be led by Beagle Trust director Dr Simon Boxall, a leading scientist at Southampton’s <a href="http://noc.ac.uk/" target="_blank">National Oceanography Centre</a>, and by Marten Lewis of the <a href="http://darwincentre/" target="_blank">Darwin Centre</a>. The initiative will replicate work done by the Beagle Trust in <a href="http://www.hmsbeagleproject.org/learning/darwin-and-adventure/" target="_blank">Brazil in 2009</a> alongside the local tall ship <i>Tocorime</i>. A team from the Welsh ITV programme <i>Coast and Country</i> will be there to film the occasion. </span><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qPU3yPkCbWs/U5BYx0VK4oI/AAAAAAAAAKo/A5g1TuX5boY/s1600/DSCN7764+(2)+(1).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qPU3yPkCbWs/U5BYx0VK4oI/AAAAAAAAAKo/A5g1TuX5boY/s1600/DSCN7764+(2)+(1).jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The <i>Earl of Pembroke</i> in Bristol, May 2014. Photo courtesy of Stewart McPherson.</td></tr></tbody></table></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>Melanie Hanveyhttps://plus.google.com/107061628045166796744noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-53999708955731293512013-02-21T15:15:00.000+00:002014-01-08T15:26:24.552+00:00February 2013 news updateThe HMS Beagle Trust is gathering momentum for the next phase of the project. Our principal focus now is to raise funds to strengthen our team, and we have engaged a fundraising consultancy to help secure funding.<br /><br />The HMS Beagle Project has now appointed a coordinator, Melanie Hanvey. She will provide administrative support to the directors and work with the UK science team based at the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton. Melanie has a background in oceanography and science communication, and was the onboard research coordinator for a global voyage of <i>M/V Oceanic II</i>.<br /><br />We also welcome two new patrons: Lord West of Spithead, former First Sea Lord and Head of the Royal Navy, and Professor Simon Keynes, Elrington and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon History at Cambridge University. Professor Keynes is Charles Darwin’s great-great-grandson, and the addition of Lord West to our team strengthens the political and diplomatic support for the project, and follows the <a href="http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130217073211/http://ukinchile.fco.gov.uk/en/news/?view=News&id=837528282">recognition of the trust’s work by Prime Minister David Cameron and President Sebástian Piñera of Chile</a> at the end of last year.<br /><br />Finally, the HMS Beagle Project’s interest in the Paglesham site, Essex, as HMS Beagle’s final resting place has been rekindled following a meeting with the Malvern Archaeological Diving Unit. They support the theory that any remains of HMS Beagle are here, as they believe that she would not have been removed for breaking up elsewhere due to the risk and cost associated with moving such a small vessel.Melanie Hanveyhttps://plus.google.com/107061628045166796744noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-66521246759850166642013-01-31T15:10:00.000+00:002014-01-08T15:25:25.899+00:00Fundacion Beagle celebrates one yearFundacion Beagle, our sister charity in Chile, has celebrated its first birthday. Fundacion Beagle was founded in January 2012, and has been working hard to build teams of scientists and educators in Chile to develop the core themes of science, and education and discovery. To find out more about Fundacion Beagle visit their <a href="http://www.fundacionbeagle.cl/">website</a>.Melanie Hanveyhttps://plus.google.com/107061628045166796744noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-28483492919294587172012-10-29T13:19:00.000+00:002012-10-29T13:19:26.081+00:00Beagle Project supporter and blogger Richard Carterreviews a Guardian ebook 'The Origin of Darwinism'.<br /><br />Go <a href="http://friendsofdarwin.com/books/randerson-darwinism/">read</a> and buy the book. As Richard says, it's good stuff for the price of a cup of coffee.Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-82153302061983196112012-08-17T10:06:00.003+01:002012-08-17T10:06:33.249+01:00Just a note of congrats to long-time supporter<a href="http://www.facebook.com/mdbarton">Michael Barton</a> and Catherine McMullen on the birth of their daughter Afton. Michael has been supporting us from the beginning and we wish all the family well in bringing the new arrival home and the for the days ahead.<br /><br />Michael's blog is <a href="http://thedispersalofdarwin.wordpress.com/">The Dispersal of Darwin</a>. We expect it to be quiet for the next few months...Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-72300397185208950402012-08-17T09:58:00.004+01:002012-08-17T09:58:49.529+01:00Lego Darwin...on the Galapagos? <a href="http://lego.cuusoo.com/ideas/view/23241">It had to happen.</a>Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-84733961243430453252012-07-27T08:33:00.000+01:002012-07-27T10:06:39.847+01:00The HMS Beagle Olympics[Cross-posted from <a href="http://friendsofdarwin.com/2012/07/20120727/">The Friends of Charles Darwin blog</a>]<br /><br />As the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Summer_Olympics" title="Wikipedia: 2012 Summer Olympics">Games of the XXX Olympiad</a> officially commence in London later today, the good people of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Much_Wenlock" title="Wikipedia: Much Wenlock">Much Wenlock</a> in Shropshire can be rightly proud that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wenlock_Olympian_Society_Annual_Games" title="Wikipedia: Wenlock Olympian Society Annual Games">their own modern version of the Olympic Games</a>, founded in 1850, inspired Baron <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_de_Coubertin" title="Wikipedia: Pierre de Coubertin">Pierre de Coubertin</a> to create what was to become the world's greatest sporting event: the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympic_games" title="Wikipedia: Olympic Games">Olympic Games</a>. Yet Much Wenlock was not the only nineteenth-century community to celebrate its own, local ‘Olympic Games’. The City of Liverpool (the world's greatest, in my rather biased opinion) held an annual ‘Grand Olympic Festival’ from 1862–67. Far more importantly, however, the crew of <i>HMS Beagle</i> held their own ‘Olympic Games’ at <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puerto_Deseado" title="Wikipedia: Puerto Deseado">Port Desire</a>, Patagonia, on Christmas Day, 1833. Charles Darwin takes up the story <a href="http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=409&itemID=EHBeagleDiary&viewtype=text" title="Charles Darwin's Beagle Diary, p.408">in his Beagle Diary</a>: <br /><blockquote>25<sup>th</sup> [December, 1833] Christmas After dining in the Gun-room, the officers & almost every man in the ship went on shore. — The Captain distributed prizes to the best runners, leapers, wrestlers. — These Olympic games were very amusing; it was quite delightful to see with what school-boy eagerness the seamen enjoyed them: old men with long beards & young men without any were playing like so many children. — certainly a much better way of passing Christmas day than the usual one, of every seaman getting as drunk as he possibly can. —</blockquote><i>The HMS Beagle Olympics</i> might not have had the wall-to-wall television and internet coverage enjoyed by modern sports fans (and endured by the rest of us), but fortunately the ship's artist, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrad_Martens" title="Wikipedia: Conrad Martens">Conrad Martens</a>, was on hand to record the event for posterity:<br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_pKmGLxdWeZc/SSG6EhtroqI/AAAAAAAAAAo/KSDSJVoW6ko/s1600-h/slinging-the-monkey.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5269697625932407458" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_pKmGLxdWeZc/SSG6EhtroqI/AAAAAAAAAAo/KSDSJVoW6ko/s400/slinging-the-monkey.jpg" style="float: right; height: 253px; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; width: 400px;" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">‘Slinging the Monkey, Port Desire’, by Conrad Martens (1833).</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Shown here is <a href="http://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/ConradMartens/fulldisplayhorizontal.php?record=31">Slinging the monkey, Port Desire</a>, the original of which now resides in Cambridge University Library. The sketch depicts <i>HMS Beagle</i> (L) and the <i>Adventure</i> (R) at anchor. In the foreground, six sailors play the naval game <i>Swinging the Monkey</i>, which involved hanging one of their number upside down until he was able to beat one of his taunting colleagues with a stick, after which, the two men swapped places. Darwin was right to worry about <i>Beagle</i>'s crew getting drunk on Christmas Day. At the very start of the voyage, two years earlier, the ship having been stuck in Devonport for weeks, waiting for a change in the weather, Darwin <a href="http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=409&itemID=EHBeagleDiary&viewtype=text" title="Charles Darwin's Beagle Diary, p.37">recorded in his diary</a>: <br /><blockquote>Monday 26<sup>th</sup> [December, 1831] A beautiful day, & an excellent one for sailing, — the opportunity has been lost owing to the drunkedness & absence of nearly the whole crew. — The ship has been all day in state of anarchy. One days holiday has caused all this mischief; such a scene proves how absolutely necessary strict discipline is amongst such thoughtless beings as Sailors are.- Several have paid the penalty for insolence, by sitting for eight or nine hours in heavy chains. — Whilst in this state, their conduct was like children, abusing every body & thing but themselves, & the next moment nearly crying. — It is an unfortunate beginning, being obliged so early to punish so many of our best men there was however no choice left as to the necessity of doing it.</blockquote>History does not record which of the <i>Beagle</i>'s crew won the most medals at <i>the Beagle Olympics</i>, nor whether they would have put much store in the motto of the modern Olympic Games: <i>Citius, Altius, Fortius</i> [<i>Faster, Higher, Stronger</i>]—although it does have a certain Darwinian ring to it.Richard Carter, FCDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06261425050063831181noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-70010149780713337022012-07-10T04:00:00.000+01:002012-07-10T14:53:30.952+01:00The Geek Manifesto: A rallying cry for evidence-based thinking<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-GB</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>JA</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> 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mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:Calibri;} </style><![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><i><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">A review of new book </span></i><a href="http://geekmanifesto.wordpress.com/about/"><i><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The Geek Manifesto</span></i></a><i><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> by guest blogger and long-time HMS Beagle Project advisor <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Anna Faherty</b>.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Vf2SR8rRv2E/T_wztgWJDxI/AAAAAAAAAKc/HOw5-J0BOC8/s1600/geek-cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Vf2SR8rRv2E/T_wztgWJDxI/AAAAAAAAAKc/HOw5-J0BOC8/s1600/geek-cover.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">I learned a new phrase while reading Mark Henderson’s new book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Geek Manifesto</i>: “evidence abuse”. Like substance abuse, it might start small, but can soon escalate to dangerous proportions. Class A examples of evidence abuse include:<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"></div><ul><li><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Evidence shopping</b> – looking for evidence that supports your view and ignoring anything that doesn’t;</li><li><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Imaginary evidence</b> – citing fictitious evidence to support your view;</li><li><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Clairvoyant evidence</b> – prejudging that the evidence will support your view before it has even been gathered; and</li><li><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Secret evidence</b>– citing unpublished (and therefore inaccessible) evidence to support your view.</li></ul><!--[if !supportLists]--><o:p></o:p><br /> <div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">A former science editor of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Times,</i> Henderson makes the case that, along with plain old fixing or mishandling of evidence, politicians on both sides of the Atlantic have a dangerous habit for all of the above. He discusses the importance of science within society, but more generally emphasises the importance of taking an evidence-based approach to public policy.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">The examples of evidence abuse Henderson cites (as might be expected, the ten chapters of the book are supported by 58 pages of references) are a shocking read, especially when shown alongside sobering statistics about the underrepresentation of scientists – people who live and breathe evidence-based thinking – in the political process. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Geek Manifesto</i> is a call for anyone (both scientists and those who appreciate and understand the methods and value of science) to change this sorry state of affairs. In that sense, it is a much more practical book than that other beacon of evidence-based thinking, <a href="http://www.harpercollins.co.uk/Titles/36492/bad-science-ben-goldacre-9780007284870"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bad Science</i></a> by Ben Goldacre. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Goldacre’s book is a similarly shocking exposé of misrepresented or misappropriated science, yet riled readers (and I defy anyone not to be riled by the shenanigans of a certain <a href="http://www.badscience.net/2007/02/ms-gillian-mckeith-banned-from-calling-herself-a-doctor/">‘Dr’ Gillian McKeith</a>) have little recourse to change the situation. Not so with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Geek Manifesto</i>.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">We can change things, says Henderson – and without too much effort. Some of his suggestions include:<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo2; text-indent: -18.0pt;"></div><ul><li>Write to your MP, representative or senator about science issues, share useful information with them and let them know that their pursuit or support of evidence-based policy will encourage you to vote them into a second term.</li><li>Fact-check politicians’ policy announcements and embarrass any evidence abusers by publishing details to the world through social media.</li><li>Even if you’re not an expert, share your views in <a href="http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Governmentcitizensandrights/UKgovernment/PublicConsultations/DG_170463">public consultations about government policy</a> – otherwise the received view of the “general public” is likely to be that of those individuals who have been successfully mobilised by politically-savvy lobby groups, which may not always focus on the evidence.</li><li>Buy or access <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Times</i> on the days when its science supplement <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Eureka</i> is published, or read and comment on the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Guardian</i>’s science blogs</a><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(which are contributed to by <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/dr-karen-james?INTCMP=SRCH">HMS Beagle Project director Karen James</a>). Both will demonstrate to the mainstream media that good quality science coverage pays.</li><li>Give friendly advice to journalists when you see them getting something wrong. If they fail to heed it, complain to their editor, or the <a href="http://www.pcc.org.uk/complaints/makingacomplaint.html">Press Complaints Commission</a>.</li><li>Join the <a href="http://sciencecampaign.org.uk/?page_id=3315">Campaign for Science and Engineering</a> and <a href="http://scienceisvital.org.uk/join/">Science is Vital</a>, or support <a href="http://www.senseaboutscience.org/pages/support-us.html">Sense About Science</a>.</li></ul><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Even if you don’t want to take the political process in hand yourself, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Geek Manifesto </i>still provides a thought-provoking discussion of “why science matters” (the subtitle of the book) to a range of social issues, including education, the criminal justice system and economics as well as the more obvious areas of healthcare and the environment. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">It includes an excellent summary of what science is (and what it is not) – my favourite part of which is the idea that science isn't a noun, it's a verb, which is rather reminiscent of <a href="http://throughthesandglass.typepad.com/through_the_sandglass/2009/02/in-high-spirits-darwin-on-geology-3.html">Charles Darwin's penchant for “geologising”</a>... While it’s a great idea <a href="http://geekmanifesto.wordpress.com/2012/06/14/the-geek-manifesto-is-going-to-every-mp/">to send every British MP a copy of the entire book</a>, how many will actually read it? Printing out pages seven to nine and forcing them each to learn how science works by heart might perhaps be a more effective option.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Henderson also shares an insightful analysis of why the union of science and politics is so problematic – just like journalists and scientists, politicians and scientists think <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">very</i> differently and value different things. Changing your mind is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">de rigeur</i> for scientists who come across new evidence; it’s a sign of weakness for a politician. Scientists value experiments and what they can learn from failure; politicians won’t admit that most new policies are in fact experiments and therefore fail to learn anything from them. Scientists want to answer questions; politicians want to talk about solutions. Scientists think their work, and “the numbers”, should do the talking; politicians want qualitative narratives about outcomes and impact. Scientists value evidence-based policy; politicians want policy-based evidence. And so on…<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">There’s no shying away from outlining the work scientists themselves need to do to improve their own lobbying and communication skills, though. Or of admitting that many policy decisions may ultimately go against the evidence – for a number of reasons. Henderson simply wants politicians to be honest if that turns out to be the case. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Still, the book isn’t just calling for <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">politicians</i>to be “intelligent consumers of science, [who] must know how to interrogate purportedly scientific findings to judge their reliability... be able to recognise the rules of thumb by which scientists evaluate others' work, such as good controls, peer-reviewed publication and republication, and ... have a feel for spotting extraordinary claims that require extraordinary evidence." </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Henderson is also aiming towards <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">everyone</i> having a sound appreciation of the wonder of science, the contributions it makes to the modern world and the power of its experimental methods – which can be applied to just about any part of our lives. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">That’s an aim shared by <a href="http://www.hmsbeagleproject.org/about/">the vision of the HMS Beagle Project</a>. So, perhaps we should add another bullet point to the list above:<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-indent: -18.0pt;"></div><ul><li>Support the HMS Beagle Project by <a href="http://www.hmsbeagleproject.org/donate/">making a donation</a>, or talking to your employer about <a href="http://www.hmsbeagleproject.org/sponsors/">corporate sponsorship</a>.</li></ul><!--[if !supportLists]--><o:p></o:p><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">If you're not already a card-carrying geek, I recommend <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Geek Manifesto</i>, along with Goldacre's <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bad Science</i>, as an excellent way of getting up to speed on how science works, why it's important and how evidence is often abused, miscommunicated or full-on ignored at the general public’s expense. If you’re a scientist, you’ll find <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Geek Manifesto</i>shocking and inspirational in equal measure, and almost certainly be moved to do something about it. As an HMS Beagle Project supporter, you're already making a difference, but there's plenty more ideas in the book if you want to become more active.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial; line-height: 115%;">Anna Faherty</span></i></b><i><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial; line-height: 115%;"> is a Cambridge University Natural Sciences graduate who specialised in physics and theoretical physics. She’s an award-winning lecturer and has developed school-level learning resources for a range of clients, including national government-funded institutions such as the Science Museum and the National Maritime Museum. Despite a shortage of specialist physics teachers, under </span></i><a href="http://www.education.gov.uk/inthenews/inthenews/a0078044/government-sets-out-plans-to-attract-the-best-graduates-into-teaching"><i><span style="font-family: Arial; line-height: 115%;">Education Secretary Michael Gove’s policy</span></i></a></span><i><span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"> would be unable to train as a school teacher – because she only achieved a third class degree. The evidence for Gove’s decision is unclear…<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div><!--EndFragment--><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #222222;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"></span></span>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-30774763026367124252012-07-08T23:48:00.003+01:002012-07-08T23:48:44.677+01:00Blogkeeping: important stuff.1. Dr Karen James, scientist of this parish, has jumped a very important hurdle. She has made the first cut for NASA astronaut training. If there is anyone not aware of this (Dr. K is a prolific tweeter) do send her congrats and best wishes for whatever comes next in the selection process. This is big, it is clever and it is richly deserved. <br /><br />Britain had this talented lady working under our scientific eaves and we?<br /><br />Let her escape to her native America. <br /><br />2. Who isn't interested in dinosaurs? If you are, <a href="http://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/">Dave Hone's Archosaur Musings</a> is a great read. A bone-a fide palaeontologist, smart as paint and writes well.Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-21622185859539100402012-07-04T03:28:00.000+01:002012-07-04T03:28:00.563+01:00Darwin's Armada and beyond - are sailing and science the perfect match?<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 14px;">By Australian guest blogger Rachel Slatyer. Rachel is a PhD candidate studying adaptation in alpine grasshoppers. She spends her spare time sailing on tall ships and hopes to combine her science and sailing passions through involvement in the HMS Beagle Project.</span></i></span><br /><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">I recently started reading <i><a href="http://www.iainmccalman.com/books/darwins-armada/" target="_blank">Darwin's Armada</a></i>, about the voyages undertaken by Charles Darwin, Joseph Hooker, Thomas Huxley and Alfred Wallace, and how these voyages influenced their scientific ideas. The results – not least <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_selection" target="_blank">the theory of evolution by natural selection</a> – speak for themselves. It made me think about how many other voyages led to scientific discoveries, or provided an opportunity for a researcher to clear their mind and make sense of a problem.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">For my birthday last year, my Dad gave me an inspired gift – a book entitled <i><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4834648-voyages-of-discovery" target="_blank">Voyages of Discovery</a></i>. Upon opening the book I immediately decided I was born in the wrong era (and the wrong gender, because a woman in the early days of sailing exploration would’ve had a mighty hard time getting a berth on a ship, let alone a position as a scientist). </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">While this book focussed on natural history - and on the beautiful illustrations produced on voyages before photography - I was sure other fields must have had their own “voyages of discovery”. I set about doing some background reading and stumbled across some amazing stories – some well-known and others less so (at least, I’d never heard of them!).<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">With the recent <a href="http://www.transitofvenus.org/" target="_blank">transit of Venus</a>, and my work on the replica of Captain Cook’s <i>Endeavour</i> earlier in the year, the first example that sprung to mind was the <i>Endeavour’s</i> voyage to track the 1769 transit of Venus. Four times every 243 years, Venus passes between the Earth and the sun. With a few measurements and some complicated mathematics, once can calculate the distance from Earth to the Sun. </span><br /><br />Cook left England in 1768, sailing the <i>Endeavour</i> to Tahiti, where the Royal Society had decreed the transit be viewed. Much to my disappointment, Cook and the astronomer Charles Green observed the transit from the shore, as they needed a stable platform and plenty of space – two features entirely lacking on a ship and particularly on the <i>Endeavour</i> – for accurate observations.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fg8OjnbvwcI/T-8iw0-hDrI/AAAAAAAAAJ4/PX5S0wl7Vtw/s1600/DSCN3666.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fg8OjnbvwcI/T-8iw0-hDrI/AAAAAAAAAJ4/PX5S0wl7Vtw/s400/DSCN3666.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Captain Cook passed through Java, home to the black panther, on the return voyage from Tahiti. <br />He lost 40% of his crew to a fever picked up there.</i></span></span></td></tr></tbody></table>Sixty years after <i>Endeavour</i> left England, an <a href="http://www.sil.si.edu/digitalcollections/usexex/" target="_blank">armada of exploration ships</a> departed the shores of the United States. The USS <i>Vincennes</i>, USS <i>Peacock</i>, US Brig <i>Porpoise</i>, USS <i>Relief</i>, US Schooner <i>Sea Gull</i> and the US Schooner <i>Flying</i>, with a combined displacement of 2157 tons, carried 346 men including 7 scientists, around the world in 4 years (there’s nothing quick about sailing expeditions). </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><span lang="EN-AU"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">The figures from the expedition are mind-boggling – nearly 3,000 bird, mammal and fish specimens, over 50,000 plants representing 10,000 species. These collections were to form the foundations of the Smithsonian Institute, and 24 scientific volumes were produced from discoveries made during the expedition, covering fields including meteorology, zoology, botany and physics. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mbcP6Gm5HmM/T-8jUcs7fMI/AAAAAAAAAKA/xe9IO-o5TYA/s1600/US+Ex+Ex+visited+New+Zealand+and+brought+back+ethnographic+artefacts.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="307" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mbcP6Gm5HmM/T-8jUcs7fMI/AAAAAAAAAKA/xe9IO-o5TYA/s400/US+Ex+Ex+visited+New+Zealand+and+brought+back+ethnographic+artefacts.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">The US Ex Ex visited New Zealand and brought back ethnographic artefacts. <br />Today, tall ships still ply these beautiful coastlines.</span></i></span></td></tr></tbody></table>Another 60 years on, in 1893, the Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen sailed into the Polar Sea on his ship the <i><a href="http://www.frammuseum.no/" target="_blank">Fram</a></i>. A far cry from the US Expedition, Nansen took just 12 men with him. Nansen’s goal was to reach the North pole and, in doing so, prove Henrik Mohn’s theory of an east-to-west current over the Arctic Ocean – this it did spectacularly and also proved that the polar ice sheet was just that – ice – with no continent buried underneath. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">How did he do this? Well, Nansen designed a ship specifically to withstand pressure from the ice and a hull shaped so that the ice forced it upwards rather than down into the ocean depths. Nansen then sailed her into the ice pack and waited for the currents to push the ship to the North Pole. After 18 months of inching across the Arctic Ocean, Nansen left the ship in an attempt to reach the Pole. Although Nansen didn’t make it to the Pole, he went further north than anyone had been before. His ship continued her slow and steady progress to the North Atlantic and was finally freed from the ice after nearly three years. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">Each of the voyages above embarked with the specific purpose of making scientific discoveries. Others, however, stumbled on scientific breakthroughs unexpectedly. In 1840, German doctor Robert Mayer signed on to a Dutch ship bound for Java. During the voyage, Mayer came across two interesting phenomena: first, that the ocean becomes warmer in a storm and second, that in warm environments (like Indonesia) blood from the veins was more brightly red than it is in cold environments (like Germany). </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">Somehow, from these seemingly unrelated observations, Mayer formulated the first law of thermodynamics – the conservation of energy. Unfortunately for Mayer, English physicist James Joule came up with the same idea not long after and, being a qualified physicist, was given all the credit. I still think this counts as a discovery made at sea. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mV48vXm_HdE/T-8h0iN8nvI/AAAAAAAAAJo/IeGvlK7ykHY/s1600/Potential+to+kinetic+energy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mV48vXm_HdE/T-8h0iN8nvI/AAAAAAAAAJo/IeGvlK7ykHY/s400/Potential+to+kinetic+energy.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i>A fall from here would be a demonstration of the first law of thermodynamics, with your potential energy at the top of the mountain being converted into kinetic energy as you fall.</i></span></span></td></tr></tbody></table>One thing I realised while I was reading about these voyages was that there were a lot of them! It seems like the great age of sail coincided with a great age of scientific discovery. Was this a coincidence? </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">Here is a question to ponder: did sailing ships serve merely as vehicles, in the days before aeroplanes, or were they (and are they still) a quintessential component of scientific discovery? In other words, is there something about being stuck in a small, crowded space in the middle of the ocean for weeks or months on end that inspires scientific inquiry? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-AU">I’m inclined to believe that bobbing up and down on a still day, or racing along with a good wind abaft the beam allows the mind (at least the part that isn’t concerned with the weather, the minutiae of sailing the ship or the delicious smells wafting up from the galley) to wander into all sorts of weird and wonderful places and forces one to take the time to let the little whispers of ideas grow and develop. And if that’s not enough, a sailing ship did, and still can, take you to remote and wonderful places where there is always the possibility of discovering something new.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-62065887040723611442012-06-30T02:12:00.002+01:002012-06-30T17:16:30.590+01:00The 21st Century Naturalist (Or What the HMS Beagle Project Means to Me)<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 18px;"><i style="font-weight: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Guest post by Rob Viens, science teacher and current Dean of the Science Division at Bellevue College in Washington State. See <a href="http://blog.hmsbeagleproject.org/2012/04/sick-and-tired-in-brazil.html" target="_blank">here</a> for Rob's earlier post about facing illness and fear in the jungle.</span></i></span><br /><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal">For the past few months I have been following Darwin's voyage on the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>through the daily entries in his personal diary and field notebooks – trying to get to know him as a person and relive his first encounters with the natural environment of the New World. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LURj9c2Jynk/T-5RBAYAMnI/AAAAAAAAAJI/ceb2nu-sjBA/s1600/English+Heritage+Darwins+Cabin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LURj9c2Jynk/T-5RBAYAMnI/AAAAAAAAAJI/ceb2nu-sjBA/s400/English+Heritage+Darwins+Cabin.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Down House/English Heritage recreation of Charles Darwin at work in his cabin. <br /><i>Photo Lisa Taylor</i></td></tr></tbody></table></div><div class="MsoNormal">Among other things, I have come to the conclusion that being a naturalist may be a lost art and, more importantly, that the world needs naturalists like Charles Darwin more then ever before. And although having more full-fledged, full-time naturalists would be ideal, I think it would benefit all scientists to have a certain degree of training as a naturalist. Why, you might ask? Well, because naturalists are a particularly unique type of field scientist that can (1) make good observations, (2) integrate many different fields of study, and (3) share their discoveries by writing about the natural world. Let me elaborate.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">First – as others have noted, Darwin was a fantastic observer of the natural world, a skill that is particularly well honed in any good naturalist. Observations are the cornerstone of good science (along with good questions, as Rachel Slatyer noted in an <a href="http://blog.hmsbeagleproject.org/2012/04/questions-questions.html" target="_blank">earlier blog</a>). They are the foundation of good interpretations – so if the observations are bad, the hypotheses are meaningless. Placing a scientist in an explored region with only a pen and paper requires them to really think about how to observe and how to use descriptive writing to paint a picture. I like to emphasize this with my students and really try to have them describe things in as much detail as possible.<o:p></o:p></span><br /><span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LkL2XkmwqWo/T-5OL1udyKI/AAAAAAAAAI8/OZQYe97W_Oc/s1600/darwinfinches.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="225" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LkL2XkmwqWo/T-5OL1udyKI/AAAAAAAAAI8/OZQYe97W_Oc/s320/darwinfinches.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Some of Darwin's finch sketches, reproduced in the beautiful blog <a href="http://venetianred.net/tag/charles-darwin/" target="_blank">Venetian Red</a>, <br />wherein two artists turn the tables and explore ideas through art.</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Second – naturalists have the ability to synthesise many different disciplines. The 20<sup>th</sup> century saw scientists become more and more specialized. Today, for example, there are biologists who specialize in the A-G-C's of genetics without ever examining a "living" organism. Many of the global environmental issues of today require us to take a much more interdisciplinary look at a problem if we ever hope to come to a solution.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">In this regard Darwin was a exceptional naturalist. Don't get me wrong - he made mistakes (which is OK in science) - but I never cease to be amazed at the range of subjects Darwin wrote about during his travels. Geology, of course, was a central theme, as are biology and ecology, but he also hypothesised about meteorology, astronomy, oceanography, chemistry, and many other subfields of science. His attention to detail meant that his hypotheses were often on the mark. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-a7pWzQUOI0Q/T-5GGYk_9vI/AAAAAAAAAIc/y70_oTVRwFI/s1600/Arquipe%CC%81lago_de_Sa%CC%83o_Pedro_e_Sa%CC%83o_Paulo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-a7pWzQUOI0Q/T-5GGYk_9vI/AAAAAAAAAIc/y70_oTVRwFI/s400/Arquipe%CC%81lago_de_Sa%CC%83o_Pedro_e_Sa%CC%83o_Paulo.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">St Paul's Rocks today - still not a typical ocean island. <br /><a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arquip%C3%A9lago_de_S%C3%A3o_Pedro_e_S%C3%A3o_Paulo.jpg" target="_blank">Photo John Vergari, Wikimedia Commons</a></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">One example of this came in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean where he recognised that St. Paul's Rocks was not typical ocean island but instead was made of the rare rock serpentinite (which we now know is a piece of the mantle). This is amazing considering that he was a 23-yr old with just a few months of formal training in geology (via Adam Sedgwick).<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Third – a true naturalist is more than a scientist (and I mean that not as an insult to scientists </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Wingdings;">J</span><span lang="EN-US">). They are writers and often poets or artists, and have the ability to share the wonder of nature with the rest of the world. Ed Abbey (not a scientist, but a good observer in his own right) once wrote:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 31.5pt; margin-top: 0cm;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US">"Any good poet, in our age at least, must begin with the scientific view of the world; and any scientist worth listening to must be something of a poet, must possess the ability to communicate to the rest of us the sense of love and wonder at what his work discovers." </span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-US"><i><br /></i></span></div><div style="text-align: right;"><span lang="EN-US"><i>(from Abbey's essay <a href="http://www.blogger.com/"><span id="goog_1545619316"></span>Come on In<span id="goog_1545619317"></span></a>, excerpted by Ranger Kathryn Burke of Arches National Park, a geological wonderland Darwin might have loved)<o:p></o:p></i></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><div style="text-align: right;"><br /></div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Darwin had this skill, too. I'm only about five months into his diary/journals (I'm trying not to read ahead so that I can relive the trip in real time) and I can already appreciate Darwin's poetic writing style, and his ability to infuse his excitement into his words. Take, for example, his first impression of he New World Forest upon arriving in Brazil in February 1832:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 27.0pt; margin-top: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-US">“The delight one experiences in such times bewilders the mind. —if the eye attempts to follow the flight of a gaudy butter-fly, it is arrested by some strange tree or fruit; if watching an insect one forgets it in the stranger flower it is crawling over. — if turning to admire the splendour of the scenery, the individual character of the foreground fixes the attention. The mind is a chaos of delight, out of which a world of future & more quiet pleasure will arise. — I am at present fit only to read Humboldt; he like another Sun illumines everything I behold.” </span><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><span lang="EN-US">(<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="http://darwin-online.org.uk/manuscripts.html" target="_blank">Darwin's Beagle Diary</a>,</i> 28 February 1832)<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-slTxxsJVxTU/T-5HzS1kDNI/AAAAAAAAAIk/42aKnRFp7z4/s1600/Fore%CC%82t_vierge_du_Bre%CC%81sil.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="287" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-slTxxsJVxTU/T-5HzS1kDNI/AAAAAAAAAIk/42aKnRFp7z4/s400/Fore%CC%82t_vierge_du_Bre%CC%81sil.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Brazilian forest as Darwin experienced it, from a painting he cited.<br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:For%C3%AAt_vierge_du_Br%C3%A9sil.jpg" target="_blank"><i>Forêt vierge du Brésil, </i>Charles de Clarac</a></td></tr></tbody></table><span lang="EN-US">What this all boils down to, is that before making the trip on the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle, </i>Darwin had the potential to be a great scientist – he certainly had an eye for detail and loved to collect and catalog things. But what really made him a great scientist was having the opportunity to hone those skills as a naturalist on the voyage of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>. There is nothing like being in the field to open your eyes (and ears and nose) to the details and relationships among the living and nonliving world. Reconstructing the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>, and setting sail to explore the natural word, has the potential to inspire new ideas and train new scientists with the skills of a naturalist. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">So what does the HMS Beagle Project mean to me? It is a chance to re-explore the world through the eyes of a naturalist – absorbing the whole of nature and synthesizing the "natural sciences" into something that is greater than the sum of its parts. It is a chance to rekindle the role of the naturalist and train a new generation of scientists to be able to observe, hypothesise and solve problems in a holistic way. It is a chance to share the beauty and splendour of the natural world through art and poetry. When I think about how important this trip was to Darwin, and the legacy it has left us, I can only wonder what having another opportunity to explore the world via a 21<sup>st</sup> century <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i> could mean for the future. I hope some day to know the answer.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 6px; padding-left: 6px; padding-right: 6px; padding-top: 6px; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xbwIn3n4by0/T-5Lw3p77DI/AAAAAAAAAIw/Oe_3GO0bgMU/s1600/darwin+tree+APBio.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xbwIn3n4by0/T-5Lw3p77DI/AAAAAAAAAIw/Oe_3GO0bgMU/s320/darwin+tree+APBio.jpg" width="200" /></a></div></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">This reproduction of Darwin's Tree of Life diagram is from a <a href="http://apbio12007.blogspot.com/2007/09/evidence-of-evolution-by-natural.html" target="_blank">Levittown, PA high school biology website</a>, worth a visit in itself to see how dedicated teachers are getting science across to young people.</span></div></td></tr></tbody></table></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">As a newcomer to the project, I'm curious to know - what does the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">HMS Beagle Project</i> mean to you?<o:p></o:p></span></div>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-88285443904945088452012-06-26T11:58:00.000+01:002012-06-26T12:02:03.055+01:00Bird's eye view of the Beagle's grave.A fascinating blog post from <a href="http://inamidst.com/sbp/">Sean B. Palmer</a>. <br /><br />He has<a href="http://sbp.so/beagle"> published aerial photos and maps</a> of the Beagle's proposed resting place near Paglesham.<br /><br />The site <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3490564.stm">was identified in 2004 by Dr Robert Prescott</a> formerly of ST Andrews University. Ground penetrating radar shows the outline of something hull-like 5 metres down in the ooze. There is a pretty good document trail suggesting that this is indeed the Beagle's final berth.<br /><br />As we have said here before, HMS Beagle is one of the most significant ships in British, world and scientific history.<br /><br />If the spot marked in Mr. Palmer's position is indeed Beagle's present resting place it should not be her last.<br /><br />No nation that calls itself a civilized, advanced society should let such an icon of adventure, exploration and scientific endeavour rest under five metres of Essex mud.<br /><br /><br /><br />Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-76300322762517642362012-06-25T12:08:00.001+01:002012-06-25T12:08:57.716+01:00Why we need a Beagle (n)To help stop this kind of intellectual abuse of schoolchildren happening.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.scotsman.com/the-scotsman/scotland/loch-ness-monster-cited-by-us-schools-as-evidence-that-evolution-is-myth-1-2373903">US creationist text book uses Loch Ness Monster to 'disprove' evolution</a>.<br /><br />As the good book says, 'Canst though draw out leviathan with a hook?' Not in this case, it doesn't exist.<br /><br />'Ya great numpties,' as they'd say on the banks of Loch Ness.Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-2811177087104702692012-06-25T04:22:00.005+01:002012-06-25T16:33:16.612+01:00Lonesome George 19??-2012<br /><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I just learned that Lonesome George, last of the Pinta Island tortoises, has died, signaling the extinction* of that subspecies of Galapagos giant tortoise,<i> Chelonoidis nigra abingdoni</i>.<br /><br /><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The coverage is still flooding in, but the best so far is <a href="http://www.galapagosdigital.com/journal/2012/6/24/interview-with-biologist-edwin-naula-director-of-the-galapag.html" target="_blank">this short but poignant interview</a> with Director of the Galapagos National Park. It seems George's body was discovered by Fausto Llerena, "a park ranger who coincidentally rescued Lonesome George from Pinta island in 1972 and took care of him all these years." (h/t to <a href="https://twitter.com/#%21/VaranusSalvator" target="_blank">@VaranusSalvator</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/#%21/cubismwonder" target="_blank">@cubismwonder</a> for the link) </div></div></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I'm just one of hundreds of thousands - perhaps millions - of visitors who "met" Lonesome Gorge (Solitario Jorge in Spanish) in his pen at the Charles Darwin Research Station on the island of Santa Cruz. In my case it was on October 22, 2010, while I was visiting Galapagos as part of the Wellcome Trust's <a href="http://galapagoslive.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Galapagos Live</a> project.<br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-uc_7IovkSHU/T-fZKWFlDdI/AAAAAAAAAKQ/KvPwyQpTl68/s1600/IMG_7381.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-uc_7IovkSHU/T-fZKWFlDdI/AAAAAAAAAKQ/KvPwyQpTl68/s400/IMG_7381.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A sign pointing the way to the Charles Darwin Research Station in Puerto Ayora, Santa Cruz, Galapagos. Photo by the author.</td></tr></tbody></table></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xXtrYZYbMq4/T-fGtITmYGI/AAAAAAAAAIo/uezF6qDOjhQ/s1600/IMG_7522.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="265" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xXtrYZYbMq4/T-fGtITmYGI/AAAAAAAAAIo/uezF6qDOjhQ/s400/IMG_7522.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Galapagos Live participants look into Lonesome George's pen at the Charles Darwin Research Station. Photo by the author.</td></tr></tbody></table><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mUMOjxbQ9_Q/T-fHTzgkIBI/AAAAAAAAAJk/L6P2ivd5_BE/s1600/IMG_7543.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="250" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mUMOjxbQ9_Q/T-fHTzgkIBI/AAAAAAAAAJk/L6P2ivd5_BE/s400/IMG_7543.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lonesome George's pen. There he is at center-right. The smaller tortoise at center-left is one of several females of another subspecies of tortoise with which he shared his pen (but alas, not his bed). Photo by the author.</td></tr></tbody></table><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LegLVBx6ej0/T-fHMuQBZbI/AAAAAAAAAJQ/voWhtptL9Nk/s1600/IMG_7536.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LegLVBx6ej0/T-fHMuQBZbI/AAAAAAAAAJQ/voWhtptL9Nk/s400/IMG_7536.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lonesome George. Photo by the author.</td></tr></tbody></table>The Charles Darwin Research Station is the beating heart of science in Galapagos. It's run by the venerable <a href="http://www.darwinfoundation.org/english/pages/index.php" target="_blank">Charles Darwin Foundation</a>, an "international not-for-profit organization that provides scientific research and technical information and assistance to ensure the proper preservation of the Galapagos Islands." Among its many (<i>many</i>) scientific activities, the station runs a tortoise breeding program which rears young tortoises for reintroduction into the wild.<br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-oe_8b8zgGZA/T-fKkDVX_oI/AAAAAAAAAJw/TlvDgg5WQZM/s1600/IMG_7500.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="263" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-oe_8b8zgGZA/T-fKkDVX_oI/AAAAAAAAAJw/TlvDgg5WQZM/s400/IMG_7500.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Galapagos giant tortoise eggs. Photo by the author.</td></tr></tbody></table><br />But the fact that I saw Lonesome George with my own eyes isn't the reason I'm so upset to learn the news of his death. It's the fact that he was, and still is, a symbol.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.savegalapagos.org/" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="83" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-H7o6Ahhn2rk/T-fWsqCBK8I/AAAAAAAAAKI/oyI-_-rNfNI/s200/Screen+Shot+2012-06-24+at+11.10.19+PM.png" width="200" /></a></div>He is the literal symbol of the <a href="http://www.darwinfoundation.org/" target="_blank">Charles Darwin Foundation</a>, the <a href="http://www.galapagos.org/" target="_blank">Galapagos Conservancy</a> and the <a href="http://www.savegalapagos.org/" target="_blank">Galapagos Conservation Trust</a>, among others. He even has his own <a href="http://www.lonesomegeorge.net/" target="_blank">clothing brand</a> (great stuff, by the way, and a portion of proceeds supports conservation).<br /><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">But more importantly he is a symbol of human efforts to slow a mass extinction of our own making. And I hope and believe he will continue on as that symbol beyond his gravelly grave.<br /><br />---<br /><br /></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">To learn more about the formerly Lonesome George, I recommend <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lonesome-George-Life-Loves-Conservation/dp/1403945764" target="_blank">Lonesome George: The Life and Loves of a Conservation Icon</a> by Henry Nicholls.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">*<a href="http://www.cell.com/current-biology/retrieve/pii/S0960982207010688" target="_blank">Russello et al. (2007)</a> reported the discovery of a tortoise "of Pinta ancestry"on Isabela Island. Now we just need one more…</span></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><br /><br />Karen Jameshttps://plus.google.com/108253290267444594610noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-1506241596781465492012-06-23T12:56:00.000+01:002012-06-23T12:56:02.991+01:00Darwin disperser Michael Bartonbrings to our attention<a href="http://thedispersalofdarwin.wordpress.com/2012/06/07/young-darwin-illustration/"> this charming illustration of the young Darwin</a> as an Galapagosian iguana might have seen him.<br /><br />The pic will be gracing the pages of Jason Chin's forthcoming book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1596437162/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=thedisofdar-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1596437162">Island: A Story of the Galapagos</a>.Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-66123903848383967152012-06-21T23:09:00.003+01:002012-06-21T23:09:48.277+01:00Go and admire this model of HMS Beagle...5 years in the building, <a href="http://rockymountainshipwrights.org/hms-beagle/">a labour of love by Richard Painter of the Rocky Mountain Shipwrights</a>.Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-58194100777168648132012-06-21T22:41:00.000+01:002012-06-21T22:41:20.633+01:00Dawkins on Bacon (the radio show, not the food).A rather good interview with Richard Dawkins on<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00pstlg"> BBC Radio 5 Live's Richard Bacon</a> show today.<br /><br />The interview was loosely about the forthcoming paperback release of Dawkins' book <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Magic-Reality-whats-really/dp/059306612X">The Magic of Reality</a> (Guardian review<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/sep/21/richard-dawkins-magic-reality-review?CMP=twt_gu"> here</a>). Richard B asked Richard D the questions that many would, and gave his guest time to answer without interrupting. A good deal of the interview deals with evolution, its place in science, the world and its doubters.<br /><br />A worthwhile podcast to download, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/dailybacon">which you can here</a>, for the next 30 days. Scroll in 3 minutes before starting to listen.Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-73805789962175222242012-06-21T22:22:00.002+01:002012-06-21T22:41:59.121+01:00Apologies, your Majesty.The HMS Beagle Project really should have been more on the ball in congratulating Her Majesty the Queen on her 60 years on the throne.<br /><br />Stage left: 'Oh for heaven's sake, has the infernal man found a link between the Jubilee and HMS Beagle?' <br /><br />Yes. For not long after her launch in 1820, HMS Beagle took part in the parade of sail on the River Thames to mark the coronation of King George the IV, during which she had the distinction of being the first man o' war to sail under the old London Bridge. (Which, in itself must have been quite a feat of seamanship on the part of the officers and crew.)<br /><br />Watching the parade of boats that braved the wretched weather to salute Her Majesty, I was deeply sorry that we haven't yet raised the necessary cash to start bolting wood together, far less have a Beagle reprising her 1820 role in 2012. Asking people for £5 million to build a boat at a time when the world economy is cratering is not an easy thing to do. But we aren't daunted. We are not here running this organization for its own sake, we want to get that boat built.<br /> <br />So, Prince Charles or Prince William, whichever of you ever next sits in Westminster Abbey with the coronation anthem <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omMndHP4tp4">Zadok the Priest</a> (scroll to 1.30 to avoid the presenter's blithering and get to the music) ringing in his ears, here's a note for your secret Coronation party plan: there will be an HMS Beagle available for your parade of sail.<br /><br />Count on it. <br /><br /><br />Peter McGrathhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15377703614157490463noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-20745247267019699532012-04-29T07:23:00.000+01:002012-04-29T07:23:02.507+01:00My other ship’s a clipper: inside the restored Cutty Sark<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> 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</style><![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">A tour of the newly restored Cutty Sark by guest blogger Anna Faherty. Anna is a writer, editor and lecturer and a long-term advisor to the HMS Beagle Project. She works with major publishers and national museums and has just completed a mobile learning project for the National Maritime Museum.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Unlike some of my colleagues, I didn't get involved with the HMS Beagle Project because of a love of ships, the Royal Navy or maritime history. What attracted me was a huge amount of admiration for Darwin, and in particular, for his sense of adventure and enquiry. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Of course, in the Britain of the 1800s, an aspiring adventurer needed one thing above all else: a ship. Ships were the only way to escape our small island, and HMS <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i> was the ship that not only carried Darwin around the world, it also sparked an incredible intellectual adventure. The six years Darwin spent travelling as a naturalist companion to Captain Robert FitzRoy set him on a path that ultimately led to the development of the theory of evolution by natural selection. That's why the world came to know the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>, and that's why it is still one of our country's best-known ships today.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Ten years after <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Origin of Species</i> outlined Darwin's world-changing theory, and just as updates for the fifth edition were being finalised, another legendary ship first set sail. The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i> wasn't a Royal Navy ship, and she certainly wasn't intended for science, surveying or fighting. Over twice the length of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>, the<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Cutty Sark</i> was a 'clipper', a term coined for long, narrow ships with tall masts and large sail areas. Powered by 32,000 square feet of canvas, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i>'s streamlined shape was designed for one thing: speed.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Entering the <a href="http://www.rmg.co.uk/cuttysark/">newly restored <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i> at Greenwich</a> you are left in no doubt about why speed was of the essence. Strolling through a doorway sliced through the American rock elm hull, you find yourself in the midst of tea, tea and more tea. Here in the depths of the lower deck you walk on a floor of tea chests, stoop below a ceiling of tea, and even smell the distinctive leaves around you. Unfortunately, not being a tea-drinker myself, I was unable to identify the specific chosen aroma - and neither could the member of staff I asked.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_656739210"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OfCYwJJgs5I/T5zUaiWvvhI/AAAAAAAAAHw/8lR97USA2HI/s1600/Cutty+pic+1+6972845946_0b88d0a2b6.jpg" /></a></span></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8162/6972845946_0b88d0a2b6.jpg" target="_blank">A ceiling of tea chests in the lower hold</a></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">We may be known as a nation of tea drinkers, but it's difficult to imagine just how big the tea business was in the late 19th century. In 1849 Britain imported over 25 million kilograms of Chinese tea. That's enough for 8 billion cups. And with customers keen to drink the freshest brew, using the fastest ships wasn't just important, it made you more money. The first tea to arrive back home commanded a premium price, making 'first to market' everyone's aim. The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark </i>didn't disappoint. She may famously have been beaten by the <a href="http://www.portcities.org.uk/london/server/show/conMediaFile.6944/A-model-of-the-Thermopylae-%281868%29.html"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Thermopylae</i></a> in 1872, after losing her rudder off Indonesia, but she regularly got away from China before her rivals.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Often described as ‘the last surviving tea clipper’, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i> wasn't all about the Shanghai to London route, though. When steamships took over the tea trade – they were faster and also more able to navigate the Mediterranean on the shorter Suez Canal route – the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i> was put to several new uses. She even ended up visiting many of the same ports as the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i> had done years before.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Clambering up from below, the tween deck reveals the ship's post-tea purpose: carrying wool back from Australia. You also learn a little about the crew and life on board. Despite her size, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i>had less than half as many men aboard as the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>, with only 19 required once she swapped tea chests for wool bales. Their regular dinner was apparently pea soup and salt pork and they drank coffee and lime. This deck also includes a table-top interactive tool where you can try your hand steering a course back from Australia. If you make the most of the trade winds and avoid the doldrums, you might make it in 70-80 days.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_656739271"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1TVd1vBs9_g/T5zVMta53gI/AAAAAAAAAH4/ZWRHQQenK-E/s1600/Cutty+pic+2+6972865106_a2a9aea155.jpg" /></a></span></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7191/6972865106_a2a9aea155.jpg" target="_blank">I wasn't quite as quick as ol' Captain Woodget<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></a></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">In 1895 (26 years after she was launched) the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i> was sold to a Portuguese company. Renamed <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Ferreira</i>, she transported various cargoes from Lisbon to Brazil, what was then Portuguese East Africa and the Southern USA. At the ripe old age of 53 – by which time HMS <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i> had been retired, broken up and (probably) half-buried in an Essex marsh – the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i> was bought by a Captain Dowman of Falmouth, Devon "for sentimental reasons." No longer used for active duty, she became a training vessel for boys joining the Royal Navy and was also opened to the public – therefore becoming an ‘exhibition ship’ before either <a href="http://www.hms-victory.com/">HMS <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Victory</i></a> or the USS <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Constitution</i>followed suit.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_656739279"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Dq1sr8gyNdQ/T5zVsSdP0bI/AAAAAAAAAIA/zGug2WPzHjA/s1600/Cutty+pic+3+6972881740_f4618b80c3.jpg" /></a></span></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7176/6972881740_f4618b80c3.jpg" target="_blank">The main mast stands 47m above the deck</a></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Stepping out of the low-ceilinged storage areas onto the main deck is a thrilling experience. You're in the thick of a maritime adventure, surrounded by rigging and ropes and able to hold the ship's wheel below flapping flags. You can explore the crew's quarters, including a compact and bijou Captain's cabin, which can be hired for your own private dining experience. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">That 'corporate entertainment' aspect comes into its own at the last port of call on your visit: the other-worldly under-ship space that is the perfect venue to impress clients. Standing under the gleaming barnacle-free copper-clad hull (another reason the ship was so fast) is a slightly surreal, but entirely memorable experience. This isn't a coincidence. Building in opportunities to generate revenue from <a href="http://www.rmg.co.uk/cuttysark/venue-hire/">corporate hire</a> is an integral part of the business plan, where ordinary visitors and school groups aren’t enough to underwrite the attraction’s running costs. The HMS Beagle Project could surely learn some lessons from this in our own development.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_656739285"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ycfbkfLto-o/T5zWLe4eBEI/AAAAAAAAAII/-o3IGq9RXFE/s1600/Cutty+pic+4+7118978619_843d2a5011.jpg" /></a></span></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7201/7118978619_843d2a5011.jpg" target="_blank">The ship is suspended in a dry berth 3m above the floor</a></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">If my first sight of the revamped ship is anything to go by, public, corporate and school-age visitors will all be impressed. Although I’d seen and visited the ship before, she’s been under wraps for so long that I was visibly shocked by my first view as I walked out of the Docklands Light Railway station that bears her name. It's not simply her size – though she is big. The elegant masts (the tallest of which reaches over 45m above her deck) and the rigging (all 11 miles of it) designed to hold 32 sails are stunning. She may be stranded in what <a href="https://twitter.com/#!/Carl_Trenfield/status/192009979526520835">some have described as a ‘hovercraft’</a> but she's no less impressive for it.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_656739264"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-skW1070OTI4/T5zWxmetkZI/AAAAAAAAAIQ/d9in0lTEj6c/s1600/Cutty+pic+5+7118990459_3a0a188afd.jpg" /></a></span></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7188/7118990459_3a0a188afd.jpg" target="_blank">Even in the gloomy April rain, the masts and rigging are impressive</a></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">All in all <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i> is a spectacular sight that conjures up the adventure of the era, and demonstrates the heart-stopping impact of a beautiful ship. A visit should be compulsory for any wavering <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i> sponsors. Even for a non-maritime buff, she made me believe in the impact a rebuilt <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i> could have, and she's already steering others on a course towards <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2012/apr/23/cutty-sark-hoist-main-sail">celebrating our maritime heritage</a>. So, until we can make <a href="http://www.hmsbeagleproject.org/about/">Professor Simon Keynes’s wish</a>come true, for now, my other ship’s a clipper…<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">See more pictures of the restored <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cutty Sark</i>at <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/9039748@N03/tags/cuttysark/">Anna’s Flickr page</a>.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br /></div><!--EndFragment-->lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com3Cutty Sark, Royal Borough of Greenwich, London SE10, UK51.4829063 -0.009564851.4779618 -0.019435300000000003 51.487850800000004 0.00030570000000000076tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-63280536758378457362012-04-20T17:36:00.000+01:002012-04-20T17:36:00.702+01:00If your house was on fire...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>By American guest blogger John Romano. John is head of science at an independent school in the US where he teaches evolution and comparative anatomy and biology. He channels his overzealous love for the natural world into positive endeavors like sustainable urban gardening and documentary-making, and says the HMS Beagle Project is "one of the most important ventures of our time." Thanks, John!</i></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"><br /></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"><b>So, if your house was on fire and you could only grab one thing...</b></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica;"><b><br /></b></span><br /><div class="entrytitle" style="line-height: 16px;"><h3 style="color: #555555; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px;"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #555555; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; letter-spacing: normal;">….what would it be? I never had an answer for this. People and animals aside, the question was always about a material possession. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #555555; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; letter-spacing: normal;">So what was it? </span></h3><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #555555; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; letter-spacing: normal;"><br /></span></div><h3 style="color: #555555; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px;"> This:</h3></div><div class="entrybody" style="color: #555555; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://paleolithicromano.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/404872_10150521081844900_699104899_9139205_1128614902_n.jpeg" style="color: #557799; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-2430" height="400" src="http://paleolithicromano.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/404872_10150521081844900_699104899_9139205_1128614902_n-e1327188767613.jpeg?w=460&h=460" title="404872_10150521081844900_699104899_9139205_1128614902_n" width="400" /></a><br /><br />I realized today that these books would be the one thing I carried out. Not because of what’s written in them; I can find that information anywhere now. No, for a very different reason.<br /><br />I've been trying to organize my life more, so I decided to tackle my basement... There amidst the cardboard boxes was the milk crate containing my “Ocean World of Jacques Cousteau” set. Peeking out ever so slightly was a very faded scrap of paper diligently holding a place in one of Jacques's books for the last 25 years. I became intrigued: it was put there by an 8-year-old me and had never been removed, indicating something I found to be of great importance. So I picked up the book and flipped to the marked page…<br /><br />Curious, now, aren't you? <a href="http://paleolithicromano.wordpress.com/2012/01/21/if-your-house-were-on-fire-and-you-could-only-grab-one-possession/" target="_blank">Read more at John's blog...</a><br /><br /></div>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com0Philadelphia, PA, USA39.952335 -75.16378939.757580499999996 -75.479645999999988 40.1470895 -74.847932tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-18272558223990945942012-04-11T16:30:00.000+01:002012-04-12T10:10:32.062+01:00Sick and tired in Brazil<h3> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i style="font-weight: normal;">Excellent post on a "cousin" blog today by Rob Viens, science teacher and current Dean of the Science Division at Bellevue College in Washington State (and soon-to-be blogger in this forum). Here's an excerpt:</i></span></h3><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #4b5d67; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i>"I felt unwell, with a little shivering & sickness… could eat nothing at one oclock, which was the first time I was able to procure anything. — Travelled on till it was dark, felt miserably faint & exhausted; I often thought I should have fallen off my horse. … All night felt very unwell; it did not require much imagination to paint the horrors of illness in a foreign country, without being able to speak one word or obtain any medical aid.” (Apr 11, from Darwin's journal)</i></span></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 22px;"><br /></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 22px;">...It is pretty clear that on this night 180 years ago, Darwin was more than a little scared. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 22px;">And really, who could blame him? He felt terrible all day and had no idea why (did he drink the water?). He had not doctors in his party, nor did he know how to communicate with the locals (language never seemed to be a strong subject for him – I can relate.) And the reality was that people died of tropical diseases in the 1800′s much more frequently than today. He knew that there was a chance that he might not survive the trip and I’m sure moments like this made that thought seem a real possibility. I’d be scared, too.</span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 22px;"><br /></span><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-dxepxud5tHM/T4aY4apl0ZI/AAAAAAAAAHY/ucfMxzBNhcs/s1600/RioCoastMap_Apr11+Rob+Viens.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="208" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-dxepxud5tHM/T4aY4apl0ZI/AAAAAAAAAHY/ucfMxzBNhcs/s400/RioCoastMap_Apr11+Rob+Viens.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Rob's map of this leg of the voyage</i></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: 1.4em; margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Read more at <a href="http://beagleproject.wordpress.com/2012/04/11/sick-and-tired-in-brazil/#respond" target="_blank">The Beagle Project</a></span></div>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com0Macaé - Rio de Janeiro, Brazil-22.3717218 -41.7857284-22.8416043 -42.417442400000006 -21.9018393 -41.1540144tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-63309146666993309822012-04-07T14:22:00.000+01:002012-04-07T23:01:44.593+01:00Questions, Questions<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 14px;">By Australian guest blogger Rachel Slatyer. Rachel is a PhD candidate studying adaptation in alpine grasshoppers. She spends her spare time sailing on tall ships and hopes to combine her science and sailing passions through involvement in the HMS Beagle Project.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">When Charles Darwin put forward his theory of evolution by natural selection, could he have imagined the enormous number of questions that would arise from it? 150 years on, the huge volume of research on evolution and how it works still seems to provide more questions than answers.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">A little over a month ago, I was sailing into Adelaide on <a href="http://www.anmm.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=1372">HMB Endeavour</a>, seven weeks after leaving Fremantle. I left the ship to start a 3-year PhD, and during my last days on board I was asked multiple times “So, why are you starting a PhD?” As I sat at my desk, struggling to absorb an overwhelming amount of new information about mountains, physiology, genetics and grasshoppers, I asked myself the same question. Why was I back at university when I could be sailing?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">My research is looking into adaptations to life in alpine environments, with a focus on grasshoppers. In Australia, true alpine regions make up a tiny proportion of the country’s land area – 0.15% to be precise. Mountains here aren’t very high either (our highest, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Kosciuszko">Mount Kosciuszko</a>, is 2200m), so there is not a lot of room for animals or plants to shift up-mountain with increasing global warming. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4md86RTtEi0/T4A6AE6hRzI/AAAAAAAAAHI/3aOH9m6oqGA/s1600/Slatyer+Brumbies+DSC00286.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="263" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4md86RTtEi0/T4A6AE6hRzI/AAAAAAAAAHI/3aOH9m6oqGA/s400/Slatyer+Brumbies+DSC00286.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brumby" target="_blank">Feral horses or "Brumbies"</a>, one of the region's more robust species / <i>Rachel Slatyer</i></span></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Here we have a dilemma – species must adapt to cope with warmer temperatures or face extinction. While there is little doubt such adaptation is possible given enough time, whether evolution can occur at a pace equal to global warming is less clear. Finding out exactly what features allow animals to live in the alpine environment (not the easiest of places) is the first step in answering this big question. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Tqq6pOXOr5E/T4A57eETKcI/AAAAAAAAAHA/IElJvu5MCSw/s1600/Slatyer+Bogong+DSC00270.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="117" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Tqq6pOXOr5E/T4A57eETKcI/AAAAAAAAAHA/IElJvu5MCSw/s400/Slatyer+Bogong+DSC00270.JPG" width="400" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Bogong High Plains, regenerating after 2003 wildfires / <i>Rachel Slatyer</i></span></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; line-height: normal;"></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Science can be a lonely road, especially at the beginning of a new project. Everybody is busy on their own work, writing, doing fieldwork, preparing talks. This was a hard change after the camaraderie of the ship. However, I was soon to be reminded how tremendously stimulating and exciting science research can be. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Last week I was lucky enough to join a group from a different university on a trip to Thredbo, a mountain village in <a href="http://www.australianalps.environment.gov.au/">the Australian Alps</a>. At our lodge on the first evening, we pored over a huge book covering every Australian grasshopper species, trying to make sense of cryptic species descriptions (“frontal costa not, or very little sulcate”?!). We studied our specimens under the microscope and had a lengthy discussion about whether a particular part of the body was best described as a “thin transverse plate” or “wedge-shaped”. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tQntIs8qHFM/T4A5zzz4ygI/AAAAAAAAAG4/KyN9w4FTAVI/s1600/Slatyer+grasshopper+DSC00274.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tQntIs8qHFM/T4A5zzz4ygI/AAAAAAAAAG4/KyN9w4FTAVI/s320/Slatyer+grasshopper+DSC00274.JPG" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Can she adapt? Chameleon grasshopper / <i>Rachel Slatyer</i></span></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The next day, we watched tiny males locked in fierce combat, and pondered why grasshoppers near the bottom of the mountain would jump when you disturb them, while those at the top would bury themselves in the grass. This must surely be an evolutionary adaptation, and I’m now curious about what would happen if you took a grasshopper from the top of a mountain and put it near the bottom – would it start jumping?</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">Questioning, proposing explanations, and weighing up the merits of different arguments is, I think, the essence of science, and what makes it exciting. We didn’t agree on an answer to any of our questions and merely came up with more, but that didn’t really matter.</span><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5ZxkWmFS9bo/T4A6PI-mP5I/AAAAAAAAAHQ/6JVwleP3kRc/s1600/Slatyer+Mtn+DSC00216.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5ZxkWmFS9bo/T4A6PI-mP5I/AAAAAAAAAHQ/6JVwleP3kRc/s320/Slatyer+Mtn+DSC00216.JPG" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Like finding a needle in a haystack: a view of Central Ramshead </span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">from a field site / <i>Rachel Slatyer</i></span></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Hiking for two hours up a mountain to look at something on the top and spending an hour searching for an animal that isn’t there doesn’t feel like work. Studying in an environment that is virtually unchanged from what it would have been a hundred or two hundred years ago, and in which there is still such a huge amount to learn provides a sense of freedom and discovery that is remarkably akin to being out in the open ocean on a sailing ship… </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So next time somebody asks me why I’m doing a PhD when I could be sailing, I’ll have an answer for them. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-91747585359607117292012-03-05T23:46:00.001+00:002012-04-13T15:28:46.250+01:00Darwin's diaries: the equator, a leap year, and Brazil<br /><div style="text-align: left;">By guest blogger, paleontologist and HMS<i> Beagle </i>archivist<i> </i><a href="http://darwin-online.org.uk/people/chancellor.html" target="_blank">Dr Gordon Chancellor</a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">HMS <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>’s voyage round the world<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </i>was well under way in March 1832. After three weeks in the Cape Verdes, Captain FitzRoy had completed his magnetic experiments and resumed the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>’s south-southwest course.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8qbRIlR5G8A/T1VOyYNLuTI/AAAAAAAAAGk/lDyLOr7F808/s1600/flying-fish+natgeo+_526_600x450.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8qbRIlR5G8A/T1VOyYNLuTI/AAAAAAAAAGk/lDyLOr7F808/s320/flying-fish+natgeo+_526_600x450.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/fish/flying-fish/" target="_blank">Flying fish, National Geographic</a></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: left;">Darwin tells us in the <i>Beagle diary </i>that there were <a href="http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/fish/flying-fish/" target="_blank">flying fish</a>, but he had to leave his specimens of marine animals unlabelled because he felt so rough from sea sickness. At next landfall, on St Paul's Rocks, the crew spent their time trying to kill as many seabirds as possible, while Darwin made one of his first major discoveries. </div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Almost all smaller oceanic islands around the world are volcanic, while most of the larger ones, such as the Falklands or New Zealand, are mainly composed of continental crust. St Paul’s Rocks are almost unique in being splinters of mantle rock from much deeper in the Earth, and it is to Darwin’s great credit that he recognised them as serpentine. As he wrote in his <i>Geological diary ‘</i>Is not this the first Island in the Atlantic which has been shown not to be of <u>Volcanic</u> origin?’ Darwin's St Paul’s specimens are still valuable after all these years, being extremely rare. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">The little <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle </i>crossed the equator on 17 February and poor Darwin and the other ‘griffins’ were tarred and feathered in the time-honoured fashion! The ship would stay in the southern hemisphere for four and a half years, bar a few days at the northern islands of the Galapagos in October 1835.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NwxMH81_Ook/T1VO-sTXNqI/AAAAAAAAAGs/ppaf11jOwsU/s1600/darwin_at_the_equator.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="328" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NwxMH81_Ook/T1VO-sTXNqI/AAAAAAAAAGs/ppaf11jOwsU/s400/darwin_at_the_equator.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Crossing the line, by T. Landseer after Augustus Earle</i></td></tr></tbody></table>A day after his equatorial ordeal, Darwin enjoyed the compensation of seeing the beautiful Magellanic Cloud and the Southern Cross constellation for the first time and the next day, Sulivan (who Darwin always misspelt ‘Sullivan’) caught a porpoise. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">By the 20th, they made the island of Fernando Noronha off the coast of Brazil, and Darwin spent a glorious seven hours climbing to the island’s peak, marvelling at the tropical vegetation in spite of the heat. Even <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle </i>buffs may have missed Darwin’s best description of the ecology of the island, to be found bizarrely in his <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Geological diary,</i> and only recently published for the first time in Cambridge's <a href="http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?viewtype=side&itemID=CUL-DAR32.39-40&pageseq=1" target="_blank">Darwin Online</a> resource.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Two months into the journey, Darwin was feeling homesick and seriously worried about the length of the voyage, but novelties like seeing the sun to the north kept his spirits up. On February 28th, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle </i>reached South America at Bahia. Darwin was to spend most of the next three and half years exploring the southern half of the continent. For now, we leave him on another leap year - February 29th, 1832 - wandering the jungle in raptures.</div>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-72659517678500649232012-02-23T15:57:00.002+00:002012-02-23T15:57:31.041+00:00A kinder, gentler view of the Falklands<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-GB</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>JA</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> 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table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} </style><![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">By UK guest blogger Dr Claire Goodwin. Claire is a marine biologist at <a href="http://www.nmni.com/" target="_blank">National Museums Northern Ireland</a>. Her work involves SCUBA diving survey projects and the study of marine invertebrates – she has a particular interest in sponges. She has recently been on diving expeditions with the Falkland Islands-based <a href="http://smsg-falklands.org/" target="_blank">Shallow Marine Surveys Group</a></span></i><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">, helping them document the sponges of the Falkland Islands and South Georgia - research highlights are <a href="http://www.nmni.com/um/Collections/Collections-highlights/The-Falkland-Islands" target="_blank">here</a></span></i><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></i></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RtDCm66SF3M/T0ZdfekPbqI/AAAAAAAAAGM/6Tx05sdD_ao/s1600/CGoodwin+Albatross.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RtDCm66SF3M/T0ZdfekPbqI/AAAAAAAAAGM/6Tx05sdD_ao/s400/CGoodwin+Albatross.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Black-browed Albatrosses on what Darwin called 'miserable islands'. Photo Claire Goodwin </td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">Here’s hoping Prince William enjoys the Falkland Islands more than Charles Darwin did. In March 1834, HMS <i>Beagle</i> arrived in ‘these miserable islands’ with a population ‘of which rather more than half were runaway rebels and murderers’. Darwin saw an ‘undulating land with a desolate and wretched aspect…everywhere covered by a peaty soil and wiry grass, of one monotonous brown colour’ which ‘can boast </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">of few plants deserving even the title of bushes’.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">Exploring the islands on horseback with Gauchos, he found ‘nothing could be less interesting than our day’s ride’, although maybe his mood was not improved by the hail and rain they tramped through and lack of sleep as ‘the ground on which we slept was on each occasion nearly in the state of a bog, and there was not a dry spot to sit down on after our day’s ride.’ He didn’t think much of the overall climate either - comparing it to the mountains of North Wales, only with more wind and rain.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">Having visited the Falklands for research over the last few years, I can agree with Darwin about the windy weather, but found its wildlife much more interesting and its human inhabitants much more hospitable. However, I did have the advantage of escaping underwater from any inclement conditions as I was participating in diving surveys with the Shallow Marine Surveys Group.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bxLe6niXDkg/T0ZbSbCuCII/AAAAAAAAAFs/xyivpZCBusM/s1600/CGoodwin+Falkland+dive.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="286" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bxLe6niXDkg/T0ZbSbCuCII/AAAAAAAAAFs/xyivpZCBusM/s400/CGoodwin+Falkland+dive.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Exploring the shallows. Photo Claire Goodwin</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">The Falkland Islands are situated in the South Atlantic roughly 400 miles from the coast of Argentina and 850 miles north of the Antarctic Circle. The archipelago includes two main islands, East and West Falkland, and 778 smaller ones. It offers a wide variety of dive sites, but<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the shallow marine zone remains largely unsurveyed. Much of the coastline around the islands is rocky, and beneath the waves, swoops into a series of dramatic pinnacles, gullies and ledges. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">What the Falkland archipelago lacks in terrestrial trees it makes up for underwater. The giant kelp, <i>Macrocystis pyrifera</i>, forms long-leaved stands which reach several meters in length, trailing on the surface and forming a trap for unwary diver legs and boat props. Tree kelp (<i>Lessonia trabeculata</i>) is found in deeper water and, as the name suggests, its holdfasts are thick and tree-like: ideal for grabbing onto in a swell but tricky to manoeuvre around when surveying. Underneath the kelp, the bedrock is covered with colourful splodges of encrusting invertebrates. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #222222; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">SMSG are conducting SCUBA surveys trying to document the shallow underwater species and habitats of the island, many of which may be new to science – on a survey of the Jason Islands in 2008 we found 12 new species of sponge, and we’re in the process of describing several new species from a second expedition. Being based on the expedition yacht <i>Golden Fleece</i>allows the group to reach far-flung corners of the islands such as Beauchêne Island – some 40 miles to the south of the main group. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #222222; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><br /></span></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w3SXNvM3tQY/T0Zct2J05vI/AAAAAAAAAF8/bqIwCw8of4o/s1600/CGoodwin+Golden+Fleece.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="280" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w3SXNvM3tQY/T0Zct2J05vI/AAAAAAAAAF8/bqIwCw8of4o/s400/CGoodwin+Golden+Fleece.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">SMSG vessel <i>Golden Fleece</i>. Photo Claire Goodwin</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">The productive shallow water environments are one reason that the Falkland Islands are globally important for bird life. The penguins, which Darwin observed crawling through the tussock grass and diving ‘like a fish leaping </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">for sport’, comprise five different species including 30% of the world’s population of Gentoo penguins (</span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Pygoscelis papua</span></i><span style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">)</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">. Two-th</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">irds of the world’s populations of black-browed albatrosses are also found here, and we often encountered vast colonies with birds sitting on sandcastle-like mud nests or wheeling overhead when we went ashore from the survey vessel.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"></span><br /><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">Less friendly were the Striated Caracaras (<i>Phalcoboenus australis</i>) or Johnny Rooks as they are locally known, which frequently dive-bombed us. As Darwin noted these ‘extraordinarily tame and fearless’ birds ‘are very mischievous and inquisitive; they will pick up almost anything from the ground’. We had to be on guard of our cameras when they were around, and Darwin’s party experienced several losses including ‘a large black glazed hat…carried nearly a mile’ and ‘a small Kater’s compass in a red morocco leather case which was never recovered’. Despite being noted by Darwin as ‘exceedingly common’, the species is now listed as ‘near threatened’ by BirdLife International. Its decline is partly because its habit of attacking lambs and weakened sheep has historically brought it into conflict with sheep farmers. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-awQH-mWpFQM/T0ZcvfjWUWI/AAAAAAAAAGE/jQPm73_ug-A/s1600/GGoodwin+Rooks+P1000594.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="282" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-awQH-mWpFQM/T0ZcvfjWUWI/AAAAAAAAAGE/jQPm73_ug-A/s400/GGoodwin+Rooks+P1000594.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rooks contemplating petty thievery - or lunch. Photo Claire Goodwin</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;">From Johnny Rooks to the endemic Hairy Daisy, both above and below water the Falklands have many species and habitats of importance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Much research has been undertaken since Darwin’s day – for example the grassland he dismissed as ‘monotonous’ has been found to harbor 175 species of plant, including 14 endemic species. The work of the Shallow Marine Surveys Group and Falkland Conservation continues to document and study the fascinating wildlife of these Islands. We hope they’re joined in the near future by researchers and students traveling with the new <i>Beagle</i>– and traveling with ample woolies and waterproofs! </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background: white; color: #222222; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri;"></span></div><!--EndFragment-->lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com2Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas)-51.796253 -59.523613-56.8328335 -69.631035 -46.7596725 -49.416191tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6343198097545879167.post-28077652677837754342012-02-18T17:08:00.001+00:002012-02-21T11:39:03.642+00:00Bringing Darwin into the 21st Century<br /><div class="MsoNormal">Charles Darwin lived much of his adult life at Down House, the family home he established in Kent. It was where he fine-tuned his theories on natural selection, and where he wrote <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Origin of Species</i>, along with several other publications.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">But it was also where he and wife Emma raised a large family, where he recreated his father's '<a href="http://5sensecity.wordpress.com/2012/02/12/what-a-walk-in-the-garden-can-do/">thinking path</a>' and walked it three times a day for 40 years, where he played billiards with the butler, and set up a wooden slide so his children could play on the stairs. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QyEJ_ms-PCs/Tz_HSjbGDjI/AAAAAAAAAFU/y5Gqu-_SsKU/s1600/IMG_1644.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QyEJ_ms-PCs/Tz_HSjbGDjI/AAAAAAAAAFU/y5Gqu-_SsKU/s320/IMG_1644.jpg" width="238" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Origin</i>, parked with the croquet mallets</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">In fact, for many of the family’s years at Down House, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Origin</i> sat wrapped in brown paper in a closet under the stairs, with sheets occasionally purloined by the children as drawing paper. Some <a href="http://darwin.amnh.org/viewer.php?history=&eid=79407">wonderful examples</a> survive in the Cambridge University Library, one of 15 sources mined by the American Natural History Museum for its Darwin Manuscripts Project.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Down House is also a good example of the evolution of museums. Using funding tied to Darwin's bicentenary in 2009, English Heritage and curator Annie Kemkaran-Smith launched a programme of <a href="http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/home-of-charles-darwin-down-house/history-and-research/sources/">modernisation</a>, and while she has ongoing targets for improvement, the museum today is a deft mix of Victorian and modern.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div class="MsoNormal">My favourite example is the recreation of Darwin’s cabin aboard HMS <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i> – a chart-room he shared with mate <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lort_Stokes">John Lort Stokes</a> and 14-year-old midshipman <a href="http://www.daao.org.au/bio/philip-gidley-king/#artist_biography">Philip Gidley King</a>. Lort Stokes (<a href="http://blog.hmsbeagleproject.org/2011/12/new-beagle-project-podcast.html" target="_blank">profiled for the BBC</a> by relative and HMS Beagle Project chair David Lort-Phillips) would go on to command HMS <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>for part of her third expedition, a six-year survey of the Australian coast. Draughtsman King – who would become a lifelong friend of Darwin’s – sketched some of the few existing images of the cabin and ship. Good company.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: -webkit-auto;"><br /></div><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 6px; padding-left: 6px; padding-right: 6px; padding-top: 6px; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-DngCQFdFR8o/T0OAxIaidpI/AAAAAAAAAFk/UOFd0qy6Sfg/s1600/English+Heritage+Darwin's+Cabin+web.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-DngCQFdFR8o/T0OAxIaidpI/AAAAAAAAAFk/UOFd0qy6Sfg/s400/English+Heritage+Darwin's+Cabin+web.jpg" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Darwin's cabin recreation, courtesy English Heritage</td></tr></tbody></table><br />The ship's cabin at Down House is uncomfortably to scale, contains HMS <i>Beagle</i> artefacts and features a wonderful bit of Victorian technology, a type of ‘<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper's_ghost">Pepper’s ghost</a>’ projecting an image of a young Charles Darwin working at the chart table. He may or may not match your own image of the amateur naturalist, but it’s more effective than mannequins and less annoying than most costumed re-enactors. The ‘ghost’ doesn't have legs, but as Darwin never got his own at sea, perhaps that’s appropriate...<br /><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /><br /><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dxLy-IY4hu_er1le6uMZ5L7pBvJS7upwikEKP6QtCYBD0ZEUUM9y_AmigtlP88KpeeoE9nE0qrmKejC8MYxNQ' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0' /></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Filmed in 'seasick-cam'. There's also a 2008 video on the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_EOFcDmsDs&context=C335b099ADOEgsToPDskIgrVQD3PdhtEvXiOIRXoo9" target="_blank">Sandwalk</a> </i></span><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i>thinking path at Down House, which is equally disturbing...</i></span></div><br /><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Another state-of-the-art feature - and the focus of the 2009 effort - is a <a href="http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/home-of-charles-darwin-down-house/darwins-notebooks/">digitised archive of Darwin’s notebooks</a> from his five-year voyage. These are accessible in an exhibition dedicated to the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beagle</i>, in a small but well-equipped resource room, and online. Scroll through scans of the actual notebooks or, if Darwin’s scrawl defeats you, access transcribed highlights.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-bottom: 6px; padding-left: 6px; padding-right: 6px; padding-top: 6px; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NfdT0NA6Xdc/Tz_Bl2iU6xI/AAAAAAAAAFM/bt-bUFP2HJ8/s1600/IMG_1629.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="298" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NfdT0NA6Xdc/Tz_Bl2iU6xI/AAAAAAAAAFM/bt-bUFP2HJ8/s400/IMG_1629.jpg" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Curator Annie Kemkaran-Smith with some of Down House's hands-on residents</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><br />The museum also includes recreations of Darwin’s study and various living rooms, plus modern and Victorian-flavoured interactive displays. The latter chart the scientist’s developing theories, working partnerships, and family life. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">As someone with a short attention span, I have to say this was one of the most enjoyable historical museums I’ve been to, with lots to offer children and adults. As part of the team trying to re-imagine the voyage of Darwin, FitzRoy and crew for a modern audience, I'll be looking to Down House's skilled mix of period, new and learning resource for inspiration. Visitor information can be found <a href="http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/home-of-charles-darwin-down-house/">here</a>.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u>Upcoming Events</u></b>: Down House curator Annie Kemkaran-Smith has offered to share her knowledge and enthusiasm for the human side of Charles Darwin at HMS Beagle Project special events later in 2012 – keep an eye out by <a href="http://www.hmsbeagleproject.org/#box2">registering for updates</a>.<o:p></o:p></div>lisamoabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04098241645251759187noreply@blogger.com0