Tags
Accumulating Glitches, biology, links, microbiome, music, Popular science, science, science and society, Science communication, Science in Society, Scitable, sexism, Species, street art, video, World War Z
It’s been a while since my last Found while foraging. I guess I’ve been busy for the past few months and these posts have somehow fallen by the wayside. They seem to be popular, though, so I’ll make an effort to keep them up and post link collections more regularly. I’m also happy to get interesting links from readers, so send me anything you think is interesting and worth sharing. And as always, though, feel free to add more links in the comments!
Science
- This great post by Sarah Jane on Accumulating Glitches discusses the mangrove killifish, which consists entirely of males and hermaphrodites. “There are no female mangrove killifish.”
- Also on Scitable, Jordan Gaines Lewis talks about gender and colour: are we pushing pink on girls or pushing boys away from it?
- Gears are usually considered the hallmark of human-built, mechanical systems, but now scientists have discovered that evolution equipped this tiny insect with gears!
- Another great article from Sarah Jane about a fish which mimics three other species, but not to hide. Instead, it uses the disguise to sneak up and attack its prey…
- I wanted to write about this story when it came out, but I decided to link to Ed Yong’s coverage instead: studies with wasps have shown that gut bacteria can act as a reproductive barrier separating species.
- This excellent piece in The Conversation UK convincingly argues that humans still evolve by natural selection.
- Newly discovered gigantic viruses with a large and strange genome may represent a whole new domain in the tree of life.
- A Capella Science: a phsysics grad student sings about science to popular tunes in Bohemian Gravity and Rolling in the Higgs. Absolutely brilliant!
- Over on SciLogs, Liz O’Connell writes about the feedback between Arctic wildfires and the greening of the tundra.
Science and society
- Neuroskeptic tackles an important problem with how we do science. “The pressure to publish often fundamentally changes not just how much scientists write, but what they can write about.”
- Mind Hacks has an article about a decades-old experiment which suggests that there may be more to drug addiction than we’ve been led to believe.
- Baldscientist shares his rules for grad students — good guidelines for anyone thinking about grad school!
Sex, sexism, and gender
- Rachel Kramer Bussel talks about sexual identity in her article Wikipedia Thinks I’m a Lesbian — And This Bisexual Is OK With That.
- If you’re interested in Raising My Rainbow, have a look at this wonderful essay by CJ’s dad: My Son Wears Dresses; Get Over It.
Politiics
- A brilliantly-made statement by the girls of the red light district.
- I was never particularly interested in watching World War Z, but my mind was made up when I read about the shocking Zionist propaganda embedded in the film. (spoiler alert!)
- In The New Yorker, Sarah Stillman writes about the use and abuse of civil forfeiture laws. Have the American police become empowered to steal cars, cash, and more from innocent people?
Visual art
- Here are some lovely pictures of space and the night sky.
- This is a contender for my favourite xkcd strip: “the only memory of the bee is a painting by a dying flower“. Brilliant!
- These amazing plant sculptures look like some kind strange fantasy landscape.
- Todd McLellan makes fascinating arrangments of disassembled objects.
Other
- I’m fortunate enough to have no trouble understanding nearly any accent of English, but I know it can be challenging for others. Language Log raises the question of how intelligible African American Vernacular English is to speakers of Mainstream English and what impact this might have.
- Neil Hilborn’s fantastic performance poem OCD. I want more of this in my life.
That’s all for now!
Inspiring Science 
Nice selection as usual, but I must say that the “geared bug” blew my mind! As per whether humans are still evolving, well, I believe that it is a matter of how do we decide to define “evolving” and at any rate, it may be a little premature to tell the consequences of these evolving trends.
Also, thanks for including my blogpost! Very honored and most appreciated… (:-)
Yeah, the gear is pretty amazing!
I think humans are definitely still evolving — that is, we’re still subject to natural & sexual selection, genetic drift, etc.
Loved the OCD poem, and blown away by “Bohemian Gravity”, sheer brilliance!
Glad you enjoyed it!