Charles Darwin in the Smithsonian’s Deep Time fossil hall

Over the Thanksgiving break, my wife and son took a trip to Washington, DC. Among the many, many places they visited was the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. There they got to see the museum’s new Deep Time fossil hall, and they sent me these photos of the Charles Darwin quote and young Darwin statue that fit so prominently in the exhibit. The quote is the last line of On the Origin of Species – “From so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved” – and the statue depicts Darwin writing in a notebook, showing his “I think” tree of life sketch.

Other views of the statue, and information regarding the time capsule that was placed underneath it, at the following links: Smithsonian, Washington Post, 1a.org, and Washington Post again.

BOOK: Science Museums in Transition: Cultures of Display in Nineteenth-Century Britain and America

This new edited volume will surely interest those interested in the intersection of museums and the history of science. While the topics of Darwin and evolution are only briefly mentioned, there’s enough natural history to warrant checking this book out.

Carin Berkowitz and Bernard Lightman, eds., Science Museums in Transition: Cultures of Display in Nineteenth-Century Britain and America (Pittsburgh: Pittsburgh University Press, 2017), 392 pp.

• Order through Powell’s City of Books • Order through Amazon.com •

Publisher’s description The nineteenth century witnessed a dramatic shift in the display and dissemination of natural knowledge across Britain and America, from private collections of miscellaneous artifacts and objects to public exhibitions and state-sponsored museums. The science museum as we know it—an institution of expert knowledge built to inform a lay public—was still very much in formation during this dynamic period. Science Museums in Transition provides a nuanced, comparative study of the diverse places and spaces in which science was displayed at a time when science and spectacle were still deeply intertwined; when leading naturalists, curators, and popular showmen were debating both how to display their knowledge and how and whether they should profit from scientific work; and when ideals of nationalism, class politics, and democracy were permeating the museum’s walls. Contributors examine a constellation of people, spaces, display practices, experiences, and politics that worked not only to define the museum, but to shape public science and scientific knowledge. Taken together, the chapters in this volume span the Atlantic, exploring private and public museums, short and long-term exhibitions, and museums built for entertainment, education, and research, and in turn raise a host of important questions, about expertise, and about who speaks for nature and for history.

Why Pigeons Matter exhibit at the Utah Museum of Natural History

The exhibit runs September 19, 2014 through January 3, 2016.

News article: Exhibit Puts Darwin Insights On Display

And here are two other short videos about Darwin and pigeons for your enjoyment:

BOOK: Life on Display: Revolutionizing U.S. Museums of Science and Natural History in the Twentieth Century

Karen A. Rader and Victoria E.M. Cain, Life on Display: Revolutionizing U.S. Museums of Science & Natural History in the Twentieth Century (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014), 456 pp

Publisher’s Description Rich with archival detail and compelling characters, Life on Display uses the history of biological exhibitions to analyze museums’ shifting roles in twentieth-century American science and society. Karen A. Rader and Victoria E. M. Cain chronicle profound changes in these exhibitions—and the institutions that housed them—between 1910 and 1990, ultimately offering new perspectives on the history of museums, science, and science education. Rader and Cain explain why science and natural history museums began to welcome new audiences between the 1900s and the 1920s and chronicle the turmoil that resulted from the introduction of new kinds of biological displays. They describe how these displays of life changed dramatically once again in the 1930s and 1940s, as museums negotiated changing, often conflicting interests of scientists, educators, and visitors. The authors then reveal how museum staffs, facing intense public and scientific scrutiny, experimented with wildly different definitions of life science and life science education from the 1950s through the 1980s. The book concludes with a discussion of the influence that corporate sponsorship and blockbuster economics wielded over science and natural history museums in the century’s last decades. A vivid, entertaining study of the ways science and natural history museums shaped and were shaped by understandings of science and public education in the twentieth-century United States, Life on Display will appeal to historians, sociologists, and ethnographers of American science and culture, as well as museum practitioners and general readers.

BOOK: The Great Human Journey: Around the World in 22 Million Days

Ian Tattersall and Rob DeSalle, The Great Human Journey: Around the World in 22 Million Days (Piermont, NH: Bunker Hill Publishing, 2013), 48 pp. Illustrated by Patricia J. Wynne.

Wallace and Darwin, the Museum Mice from the Halls of the American Museum of Natural History, are off on another adventure! It’s amazing what you can find in a museum and how far you can travel in a small time machine made from a yoghurt cup! Have you ever wondered where we humans all came from and how there came to be so many of us? The answers, as our two mice will show you, lie everywhere including in our own DNA. So there is the Big Picture of The Great Human Journey from the middle of Africa to Australia, America and Asia and then there’s the Tiny (really tiny) Picture too of molecules and cells that we can trace inside ourselves and our Genome like long strings of letters that tell us where we came from and who our ancestors were, and where they were when and how they got there! In their 22 Million Day Journey our intrepid mice, Wallace and Darwin, trace the biggest genealogy of all and find that all humans are 85% African and only 15% from the rest of the world! That is if you start counting our Genes – all 25,000 of them give or take an overlap! We took all this with us on our long walks from East Africa to Australia and from Australia to Asia and Europe between 40,000 and 50,000 years ago. 35,000 years later it only took us a few thousand years more to get from Alaska to Chile! We took our sweet time creating cultures and civilizations as we went. And we did it without GPS! And we even know we wore clothes 170,000 years ago. How? Because Lice too have DNA. It is amazing what our genes can tell us and what the genes of other species tell us too! Mitochondrial DNA we inherit from our mothers tells us where they have been. And from the tiny threads of our Y chromosomes we inherit from our fathers we can tell where they have been too. And then there’s the Rats! They followed us in our canoes and boats and stayed on islands with us where we can trace their journeys too. Wallace and Darwin have appeared in two previous adventures: Bones, Brains and DNA: The Human Genome and Human Evolution [2007] and Brain: A 21st Century Look at a 400 Million Year Old Organ [2010]. Their creators Tattersall, DeSalle and Wynne have plans to send them on further excursions in The Tree of Life and The Anatomy of Evolution. Stay tuned!

URGENT: Help fund an Alfred Russel Wallace statue!

For the centenary of Alfred Russel Wallace’s death (1913), the Wallace Memorial Fund wishes to commission a life-sized statue of Wallace for the Natural History Museum, London. They need to raise £50,000 by January 31st. Last I heard they were £30,000 short, so they really could use some more donations!

Click here to donate.

Click here to read more about the proposal for the Wallace statue.

Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913)

On the “kids book on evolution that bashes religion”

In December of last year some folks cried out (1/2/3) against a new kids book that promotes anti-vaccination, and rightly so! But so far I have only come across one person who is crying out over a kids book about Charles Darwin. Why no others? Surely a book about the life of Darwin would be dangerous in the hands of children.

The book in question is Darwin: British Naturalist by Diane Cook (which is the same as Charles Darwin), and the Discovery Institute’s Casey Luskin does not like that it is being sold in a public – and taypaxer-funded (oh, no!) – museum. First, visitors of the museum are not required to purchase the book, so what’s the problem? Second, why are they fussing? They quote a passage from the book:

How did all the many different species of plants and animals in this world come into being? The simple explanation that God had created everything did not satisfy him. It could not explain everything he had observed.

And their response:

Now I have no problem with people writing about the historical controversy between Darwin’s theory and religion, but why is this partisan message in a kids book being sold at a taxpayer-funded publicly-operated science museum?

I see no problem with the passage from the book not because I accept the theory of evolution and am (obviously) a Darwin aficianado, but because it’s true. It is historically accurate. Darwin did indeed think that special creation could not explain the origin and distribution of species on Earth. His travels in the 1830s gave him firsthand experience in observing many plants and animals of the world. The claim that this passage is “partisan” is unfair.

The DI post then goes on to charge the author of Darwin: British Naturalist of “concoct[ing] a story about how the church and religious ideologues supposedly persecuted Darwin”:

Darwin was criticized by many scientists and denounced by the religious community who claimed his theory was blasphemous. … Articles and cartoons satirizing Darwin appeared regularly in newspapers and magazines. The most common images were of Darwin’s head on an ape’s body or Darwin crawling among worms or other simple creatures. Darwin did nothing about this deliberate misrepresentation of his theory. He only smiled sadly. He had no wish to waste time defending or explaining his ideas. Instead, he went on living his quiet peaceful life, taking daily walks through the woods and continuing his scientific research and writing. Nevertheless, in his heart he hoped that one day people would understand that his purpose had not been to overturn God and destroy their beliefs, but just to prove one thing — that life was always changing.

Was Darwin criticized by scientists? Yes. Was his theory considered by some in the religious community as blasphemous? Yes. Did cartoonists use Darwin and turn him into all manner of monkeys and apes? Yes. Did Darwin respond publicly to these cartoons? Not to my knowledge. Did he live a quiet life, take daily walks, and continue working on science? Yes. Did Darwin travel the world, collect data, correspond with folks from all over the world, conduct experiments, and write many books and articles to “overturn God and destroy their beliefs”? No.

And yes, while the image from the book they share in the post may be silly, this “concocted story” is by all means fair to Darwin historically. But, since it paints a positive light on Darwin the man, the Discovery Institute of course thinks it is rubbish. What Darwin did or wrote is only a good thing for the Discovery Institute when it lends to their purposes, no matter how misleading.

I just looked up the book in the catalog of the Multnomah County Library, and there is a copy of Darwin: British Naturalist at my local branch. Looks like I will have to stop by and check it out.

An objective creation museum in the Pacific Northwest?

If you live in the Pacific Northwest and feel left out of being able to visit a creation museum, fear not!

There is much wrong with the statements made by these men reading off of cue cards.

1. Doug Bennett states that the NSM “will explain both the biblical and naturalistic points of view, side by side. In this way, visitors can see both views and then can determine for themselves which theory makes the most sense and which theory matches the evidence that we see in the world around us.” Less than a minute later, Rick Deighton states, “The museum will show scientifically how evolution is absurd.” So much for letting the visitor look at the evidence and make their own decision!

2. Evidence that confounds the most ardent evolutionists? I’d like to see what they offer that hasn’t been explained away by non-creationists, otherwise known as scientists.

3. Deighton: the NSM “will also put on display the catastrophic consequences of Darwinism. For example, Hitler and his Nazi regime could never have done what they did without the foundation of Darwinian evolution.” A tired claim shown to be wrong by historians.

4. The NSM will be different from other creation museums because it will be a “true science museum.” Yes, don’t mind the words biblical, gospel, Jesus, God, and creation that will be on many of the labels in the museum. This museum will be all about the science, okay?

I came across this video in a blog post from the Portland Mercury: A Cadre of Old, White Guys Plot a Creationist Science Museum.

A visceral experience: “Body Worlds & the Brain” at OMSI, Portland, OR

Yesterday I headed to the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry in Portland, sans wife and child, to see the exhibit Body Worlds & the Brain (which opened on October 20th for a limited engagement). From Gunther von Hagens, the exhibit “includes more than 200 authentic human specimens and highlights neuroscience, brain development and performance. Through respectful, aesthetic displays, this all-new exhibition invites intensive study and profound reflection on the power, beauty, and fragility of the human body” (more info). The displays are shown along with large text panels discussing many aspects of being human, from anatomy and development to intelligence  and emotions.

I have always wanted to see one of these exhibits of plastinated cadavers, as I have heard from other people about what they liked about it or did not. Given that the bodies are obtained from individuals knowingly providing themselves for these artistic and didactic displays, there is not much I can complain about (much effort is made in getting this point across in the exhibit). Body Worlds is simply wondrous. My initial impression is amazement, but I am sure over the next few weeks I will think about certain aspects of the exhibit (I should see if the Portland libraries have this book: The Anatomy of Body Worlds: Critical Essays on the Plastinated Cadavers of Gunther von Hagens).

One text panel had the following words, which I think sums up such an endeavor: “The creative process generates the new by seeing the known in an unusual way. It is founded on a sense of wonder and fed by the ability to pursue an idea simply to satisfy our curiosity.” A truly visceral experience. I highly encourage folks in the Portland region to visit OMSI and peruse Body Worlds, especially the dynamic poses of many of the bodies and the various organs shown in stages of disease. How often does one get the opportunity to get so close and personal to what is – and could be – inside all of us?

Enjoy the photos, which I was given permission to take and post for media purposes.

Body Worlds & the Brain at OMSI (November 6, 2011)

Sagittal 3-D Slice Body (1999)

Close-up of Sagittal 3-D Slice Body (1999)

The Angel (2005)

The Digestive System

Blood vessel configuration of the arm

The Ponderer (2005)

The Ponderer (2005), showing the brain and spinal column

Elegance on Ice (2005)

The Ringman (2002)

A plastinated giraffe (2008), which made me think of what a project it must be to pack and ship these exhibits around the world

Interior of Giraffe (2008)

The Yoga Lady (2005)

Skull and brain of an infant

Lungs of a smoker

Sitting Ligament Body (2008)

Expanded skull

The human brain

Blood vessel configuration of a lamb

Obesity Revealed

OMSI visitors observing The Head-Diver (2006)

Another view of Giraffe (2008)

C-SPAN’s American Artifacts: 1838-42 Exploring Expedition & The Smithsonian

Via the Smithsonian Libraries blog:

PBS vs. NASA: Thoughts on popular science education at a local museum

I love living in Portland, Oregon. Great nature parks. Great libraries. Great museums.

One such museum is the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI), and they always have something interesting going on. Back in April, I was able to take my son to see the Kratt Brothers. They were discussing their new children’s program on PBS Kids, Wild Kratts. Many of my readers might know them from their earlier programs, Kratt’s Creatures and Zoboomafoo. I loved these shows when I was young, and my son now enjoys watching clips and episodes of Wild Kratts on the PBS website (we do not own a television). Each episode starts out with Chris and Martin Kratt discussing a specific animal, sometimes on location. Then they morph into their animated forms and fun and adventure ensues as we learn about adaptations while the Kratts foil the plans of various villains who want to exploit the animals. Oh, and they don creature power suits.

For an event that required parents to sign up for free, but limited, tickets through the OMSI website, I expected that we would get to meet the Kratt Brothers. Their presentation for a room full of kids was about thirty minutes, and they had a question and answer session as well.

Patrick seemingly entranced by TV characters talking about animals:

But did we get to meet them, take our kid’s picture with them? Nope. After the presentation, they darted out the side door of the auditorium so fast that my son was unable to give them a small piece of octopus art he had made for them. And tears gushed. (I passed off the art to an OMSI employee I knew and asked her to make sure they get it). It was a fun event, and I support PBS and most of their children’s programming (Wild Kratts and Dinosaur Train can’t be beat for educational shows). The event, however, felt very controlled, and it lacked a sense of personal connection.

The auditorium was full for the Kratt Brothers, children’s television celebrities. Some parents were even complaining on the museum’s Facebook page that they were unable to get tickets, or heard about it too late.

In July, Patrick and I went to OMSI for two more events. Earlier in the month, we headed over to the planetarium early on a Saturday morning to witness the the very last launch of the Space Shuttle: Atlantis (STS-135). The planetarium usually shows the launches of the shuttles, but this was the LAST! We had to go. We sat in the planetarium, groggy but excited, watching NASA television for an hour-and-a-half until the countdown.

It was a great moment for me, because the three-decade history of the Space Shuttle program matches my three decades of life; and great for Patrick because he loves all things science and it’s something I wouldn’t want my son to miss.

We applauded during that final liftoff, while some of the other folks in the crowd teared up. How many people were there in the planetarium? I’d say about 40 (mostly adults), and that includes news teams who were there to film it (you can see Patrick and I for a brief moment here). That number does not begin to fill up the planetarium.

Two weeks later, we were fortunate enough to go to OMSI again to see a presentation by “OMSI Kid” and NASA astronaut Michael Barratt (he is from Camas, Washington – just over the Columbia River from Portland – and his mother volunteered for OMSI). Barratt flew on the third to last shuttle mission, aboard Discovery (STS-133) as mission specialist.

Barratt spoke of that last Discovery mission, the future of NASA’s space exploration, and the history of the name Discovery for ships of exploration (sea-going and space). He included a question and answer session, and gifted to OMSI an “I am OMSI” shirt he wore while on the International Space Station in 2009.

Before the presentation as people were entering the auditorium, Barratt posed for pictures and gave his signature. After the presentation, he did a formal photo op and signed NASA photographs.

Two things struck me about the Space Shuttle and astronaut events. Neither had filled up the planetarium. More people had come out to Barratt’s presentation than the final launch of Atlantis, but still tickets did not run out like they did for the Kratt Brothers. And while Patrick could not keep his eyes off of the Kratt Brothers, he was difficult to keep his attention in Barratt’s presentation. That is not to say he wasn’t excited to meet an astronaut! But there’s an obvious difference between them. Barratt is not a television celebrity, and children haven’t viewed him at a particular time every morning. I am not trying to diminish the Kratt Brothers here; I’d rather my son watch their show and talk about them then what shows on any other channel. I just think Barratt should have more exposure, and it would have been great to see his event overflowing. While I’m sure there’s more to the turn outs and dymanics of each event, the greatest factor is that one is television-based and the other is not.

What did Patrick have to show off seeing the Kratt Brothers? A sticker. Barratt? A signed photograph and a picture with him. Which do you think will have a more lasting impression on a curious young mind?

New articles about Darwin and evolution or related

This first one is not an article, but a dissertation:

The ministry of chance: British Romanticism, Darwinian evolutionary theory & the aleatory

by Burkett, Andrew, Ph.D., Duke University, 2008, 319 pages; AAT 3346753

Abstract The Ministry of Chance proposes that Charles Darwin’s emergent understanding and depiction of organic variation must be seen in direct and significant continuity with Romantic representations of the aleatory – that is, those forms, processes, and phenomena that are understood as governed by the operations of chance. Romantic literature murmurs quietly but continuously about the unexpected, the accidental, and the desultory. Moreover, although the concept of the aleatory has been largely overlooked by Romanticist critique, Romantic-era texts including William Wordsworth’s The Prelude (1799, 1805, 1850) and Percy Bysshe Shelley’s Queen Mab (1813), Mont Blanc (1817), and Prometheus Unbound (1820) meditate often on chance and, in so doing, reveal that Romantic literature is not only topically preoccupied with chance but that it is also structurally dependent on the aleatory. The transition from first- to second-generation Romanticism is characterized, I suggest, by a gradual change in the way in which these poets envision causality, and these two historical moments are each the topic of a subsequent chapter of this project. Furthermore, this study aligns Darwin’s conception and representation of evolution with this shift in Romanticism. Driven by complex plots encrypted in minute and variational organic forms, Darwinian evolutionary theory is similarly founded upon chance, both formally and conceptually. In the years leading up to the publication of On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1859), Darwin becomes increasingly fascinated with the aleatory. Moving beyond his analyses of island populations, Darwin begins investigating the role of chance in the dispersion of continental floral populations as examined in his “Botanical Arithmetic” drafts, a set of largely unpublished documents held at the University of Cambridge’s “Charles Darwin Archive.” My project puts this Romantic poetry and Darwinian science into conversation by drawing upon the work of three critical and theoretical fields: Science Studies, the history and philosophy of biology, and Romantic criticism and theory. Such a cross-disciplinary approach to the aleatory in these narratives helps to illuminate the ways that British Romanticism and Darwinian evolutionary theory together “cohabit” a nineteenth- century paradigm change in reconceptions of chance and causality.

From Isis:

Vivisecting Major: A Victorian Gentleman Scientist Defends Animal Experimentation, 1876–1885

Rob Boddice

Abstract Through an investigation of the public, professional, and private life of the Darwinian disciple George John Romanes, this essay seeks a better understanding of the scientific motivations for defending the practice of vivisection at the height of the controversy in late Victorian Britain. Setting aside a historiography that has tended to focus on the arguments of antivivisectionists, it reconstructs the viewpoint of the scientific community through an examination of Romanes’s work to help orchestrate the defense of animal experimentation. By embedding his life in three complicatedly overlapping networks—the world of print, interpersonal communications among an increasingly professionalized body of scientific men, and the intimacies of private life—the essay uses Romanes as a lens with which to focus the physiological apprehension of the antivivisection movement. It is a story of reputation, self‐interest, and affection.

From Museum History Journal:

The Pitt-Rivers Collection from 1850-2011

Alison Petch

Abstract This paper examines the history of one man’s engagement with one of the most dominant intellectual ideas of the second half of the nineteenth century—evolution—and the way this was given physical form in the display of his collections up to 1884. It will also discuss the subsequent changes wrought to his work by his museum descendants at the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford. The collection does not contain any considerable number of unique specimens, and has been collected during upwards of twenty years, not for the purpose of surprising any one, either by the beauty or value of the objects exhibited, but solely with a view to instruction. For this purpose ordinary and typical specimens, rather than rare objects, have been selected and arranged in sequence, so as to trace, as far as practicable, the succession of ideas by which the minds of men in a primitive condition of culture have progressed from the simple to the complex, and from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous.

From Evolution: Education and Outreach:

Darwin’s Busts and Public Evolutionary Outreach and Education

Sidney Horenstein

Abstract For the 1909 Darwin Centennial, the New York Academy of Sciences gave a large bronze bust of Charles Darwin to the American Museum of Natural History. Created by the well-known sculptor, William Couper, the bust was placed on its tall granite pedestal at the entrance at the newly designated exhibition hall, the Charles Darwin Hall of Invertebrate Zoology. Later that year, the American Museum ordered a bronze copy of the bust and presented it to Christ’s College, in Cambridge, England at the British Darwinian celebration. In 1935, Victor Von Hagen requested a plaster copy of the bust for a monument he was erecting on San Cristóbal in the Galapagos Islands to celebrate Darwin’s arrival in the Galapagos. During 1960, the American Museum of Natural History returned the original bronze bust to the New York Academy of Science, where it is now on display at its headquarters in New York City. To celebrate the Darwin bicentennial, the National Academy of Sciences recreated the bust in a computer-generated copy for display at their Washington, DC headquarters.

From Biology and Philosophy:

Empathy’s purity, sympathy’s complexities; De Waal, Darwin and Adam Smith

Cor Weele

Abstract Frans de Waal’s view that empathy is at the basis of morality directly seems to build on Darwin, who considered sympathy as the crucial instinct. Yet when we look closer, their understanding of the central social instinct differs considerably. De Waal sees our deeply ingrained tendency to sympathize (or rather: empathize) with others as the good side of our morally dualistic nature. For Darwin, sympathizing was not the whole story of the “workings of sympathy“; the (selfish) need to receive sympathy played just as central a role in the complex roads from sympathy to morality. Darwin’s understanding of sympathy stems from Adam Smith, who argued that the presence of morally impure motives should not be a reason for cynicism about morality. I suggest that De Waal’s approach could benefit from a more thorough alignment with the analysis of the workings of sympathy in the work of Darwin and Adam Smith.

If the Creation Museum where in Montana or Minnesota…

… this is what the parking lot would look like:

Via.

Darwin says, “Get me out of here!”

I thought I had shared this here before, but I guess not. From a 2007 issue of Mad (hat-tip to Why Evolution Is True):

ARTICLE: Charles W. Peach and Darwin’s barnacles

From the Journal of the History of Collections:

Charles W. Peach and Darwin’s barnacles

Lyall I. Anderson and Mathew Lowe

Abstract The University Museum of Zoology (Cambridge) holds Charles Darwin’s collection of microscope slide dissections prepared during his studies of living barnacles. This collection was assembled through an extensive network of museum contacts and amateur collectors. We examine in detail the role of one of these collectors, Charles W. Peach, a coastguard in the Customs Service. Detailed study of the slide collection reveals an internal chronology of manufacture against which timelines of Peach and Darwin’s activities can be compared. Four distinct phases of slide fixative are recognized and subsequent alterations to Darwin’s original collection can be demonstrated. The internal chronology also reveals that Darwin dissected and mounted barnacles as he received material, rather than working systematically through taxonomic groups. Aside from Peach, other suppliers of barnacles included Samuel Stutchbury, Joseph Hooker and Robert Damon.

A little science education for you…

Patrick and a curved mirror at the Pacific Science Center, Seattle

American Scientist: The 95 Percent Solution

Physics Today: The evolution of science museums

ASTC News: Rethinking the role of science centers in society

Patrick at the Audubon Society of Portland's bird sanctuary in Forest Park, Portland

NSTA Blog: Experience being outdoors in nature—how much do we need?

NSTA, Science & Children articles: Nature’s Palette and A Walk in the Woods

ASTC News: Having the evidence

Dinosaurs and Other Extinct Saurians: A Historical Perspective

The Geological Society, London has published a volume of papers on the history of dinosaur (or phylogenetically-related) paleontology, Dinosaurs and Other Extinct Saurians: A Historical Perspective, edited by R.T.J. Moody, E. Buffetaut, D. Naish (blog), and D.M. Martill:

The discovery of dinosaurs and other large extinct ‘saurians’—a term under which the Victorians commonly lumped ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, pterosaurs and their kin—makes exciting reading and has caught the attention of palaeontologists, historians of science and the general public alike. The papers in this collection go beyond the familiar tales about famous ‘fossil hunters’ and focus on relatively little-known episodes in the discovery and interpretation (from both a scientific and an artistic point of view) of dinosaurs and other inhabitants of the Mesozoic world. They cover a long time span, from the beginnings of ‘modern’ scientific palaeontology in the 1700s to the present, and deal with many parts of the world, from the Yorkshire coast to Central India, from Bavaria to the Sahara. The characters in these stories include professional palaeontologists and geologists (some of them well-known, others quite obscure), explorers, amateur fossil collectors, and artists, linked together by their interest in Mesozoic creatures.

And the papers:

About this title – Dinosaurs and Other Extinct Saurians: A Historical Perspective [Abstract] [PDF] FREE

Richard T. J. Moody, Eric Buffetaut, Darren Naish and David M. Martill, Dinosaurs and other extinct saurians: a historical perspective – introduction [Extract] [Full Text] [PDF] FREE

Mark Evans, The roles played by museums, collections and collectors in the early history of reptile palaeontology [Abstract]

H. S. Torrens, William Perceval Hunter (1812–1878), forgotten English student of dinosaurs-to-be and of Wealden rocks [Abstract]

Leslie F. Noè, Jeff J. Liston and Sandra D. Chapman, ‘Old bones, dry subject’: the dinosaurs and pterosaur collected by Alfred Nicholson Leeds of Peterborough, England [Abstract]

Federico Fanti, Life and ideas of Giovanni Capellini (1833–1922): a palaeontological revolution in Italy [Abstract]

Richard T. J. Moody and Darren Naish, Alan Jack Charig (1927–1997): an overview of his academic accomplishments and role in the world of fossil reptile research [Abstract]

Susan Turner, Cynthia V. Burek and Richard T. J. Moody, Forgotten women in an extinct saurian (man’s) world [Abstract]

Xabier Pereda Suberbiola, José-Ignacio Ruiz-Omeñaca, Nathalie Bardet, Laura Piñuela and José-Carlos García-Ramos, Wilhelm (Guillermo) Schulz and the earliest discoveries of dinosaurs and marine reptiles in Spain [Abstract]

Matthew T. Carrano, Jeffrey A. Wilson and Paul M. Barrett, The history of dinosaur collecting in central India, 1828–1947 [Abstract]

Eric Buffetaut, Spinosaurs before Stromer: early finds of spinosaurid dinosaurs and their interpretations [Abstract]

Martin A. Whyte, Mike Romano and Will Watts, Yorkshire dinosaurs: a history in two parts [Abstract]

A. J. Bowden, G. R. Tresise and W. Simkiss, Chirotherium, the Liverpool footprint hunters and their interpretation of the Middle Trias environment [Abstract]

Darren Naish, Pneumaticity, the early years: Wealden Supergroup dinosaurs and the hypothesis of saurischian pneumaticity [Abstract]

Peter Wellnhofer, A short history of research on Archaeopteryx and its relationship with dinosaurs [Abstract]

Brian Switek (congrats to Laelaps!), Thomas Henry Huxley and the reptile to bird transition [Abstract]

Kasper Lykke Hansen, A history of digit identification in the manus of theropods (including Aves) [Abstract]

Attila Osi, Edina Prondvai and Barnabás Géczy, The history of Late Jurassic pterosaurs housed in Hungarian collections and the revision of the holotype of Pterodactylus micronyx Meyer 1856 (a ‘Pester Exemplar’) [Abstract]

David M. Martill, The early history of pterosaur discovery in Great Britain [Abstract]

Mark P. Witton, Pteranodon and beyond: the history of giant pterosaurs from 1870 onwards [Abstract]

Jean Le Loeuff, Art and palaeontology in German-occupied France: Les Diplodocus by Mathurin Méheut (1943) [Abstract]

J. J. Liston, 2000 A.D. and the new ‘Flesh’: first to report the dinosaur renaissance in ‘moving’ pictures [Abstract]

Michael P. Taylor, Sauropod dinosaur research: a historical review [Abstract]

Link 182 (actually, about 40)

Now that I’m back from Texas (sister-in-law’s wedding)…

… let’s see what I’ve missed. Here are some links:

National Fossil Day is tomorrow, October 13th. Check here for events.

For the next edition of The Giant’s Shoulders, get your entries in by October 15th!

Homologous Legs: This Week in Intelligent Design – 12/10/10

Point of Inquiry (podcast): PZ Myers, Jennifer Michael Hecht, and Chris Mooney – New Atheism or Accommodation?

USA Today/Jerry Coyne: Science and religion aren’t friends

Bad Astronomy: Creationists still can’t seem to evolve

Speaking of creationists, Comfort clowns passed out copies of the faux-Origin inn Texas at a Dawkins lecture. They posted some photos online, take a look at this one. The book now has “As seen on CNN” on the cover:

Dawkins was on Bill Maher

The Sensuous Curmudgeon: Discovery Institute Targets African Americans & Discovery Institute Demands Accurate Quotes

Sandwalk: The Casey Luskin Lesson Plan on Teaching the Controversy

Please be patient, I am evolving as fast as I can!: Damed by their own words

Carnival of Evolution #28 – Featuring Sandwalk

Playing Chess with Pigeons: The Rush to ignorance tour continues

Laelaps: When Pseudo-Crocs Walked Tall

So Simple a Beginning: 150 years of Darwin, from UCI Libraries

From the Hands of Quacks: Mind & Body: The Philosopher’s Body as a Subject

The beauty of Darwin

Did you know that Noah himself went out to catch birds? From a church in Texas on my trip:

NYT/Natalie Angier: Moonlighting as a Conjurer of Chemicals

Ether Wave Propaganda: Is There a Conflict of Interest between STS and History of Science?

AHA: Richard Dawkins and Neil deGrasse Tyson at Howard University

History of Science Centre’s blog: The Forgotten

Whewell’s Ghost/Evolving Thoughts: The historical way to do science

Whewell’s Ghost (@beckyfh): Yes, histories of science are worth reading! & David Willetts and the history of science

@beckyfh: Chronometer from HMS Beagle (91st object in British Museum’s History of the World in 100 Objects) info/podcast

PACHSmörgåsbord: Popular History of Science for the American G.I.

The Species Seekers: This is the Great Age of Discovery

Bozeman Daily Chronicle: Great minds gloomy about humans’ future

American Scientist: The 95% Solution (about informal science education). Also, from Physics Today: The evolution of the science museum

Why Evolution Is True: The Hall of Human Origins at the National Museum of Natural History (more about the funder of this exhibit and religion and other thoughts here, here, here, and here. PZ chimes in here and here.)

Periodic Tabloid: Making Connections: “The Big Picture” and the History of Science

Charlie’s Playhouse: Does Steven Pinker have kids? He should. & New podcast with Kate at Parenting Within Reason!

Quodlibeta: Doubting Darwin’s Doubt

Times Archive Blog (from 2009): Did Charles Darwin stick pins into babies?

Asa Gray born 200 years ago, how to celebrate

Asa Gray (1810-1888)

Botanist Asa Gray and friend of Darwin was born November 18, 1810. This year, then, marks a bicentennial. If you happen to be near the Harvard Museum of Natural History, there are events this fall to celebrate his legacy:

RE:Design: A Dramatization of the Correspondence of Charles Darwin and Asa Gray
A one-act play performed by the Menagerie Theatre Company and a panel discussion with Paul Bourne and Janet Browne
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 21, 6:00 PM
RE: Design is a fascinating dramatization of the 30 years of correspondence between Charles Darwin in England and Asa Gray in Boston, produced by the English theatre group, Menagerie, and commissioned by the Darwin Correspondence Project at the University of Cambridge.

Adapted exclusively from their own words — including previously unpublished letters — RE: Design offers a window onto the minds and worlds of these two groundbreaking 19th century naturalists as they debate the consequences for religious belief of Darwin’s new theory of evolution by natural selection. Intellectual debate around science and religion is interwoven with gossip, opinion, and anecdotes about everything from war and slavery, to family incidents and unfortunate gardening accidents. The one-act play will be followed by a panel discussion with RE:Design director Paul Bourne and Janet Browne, the Aramont Professor of the History of Science at Harvard. (This event is in lieu of Professor Janet Browne’s lecture, Corresponding Naturalists: Asa Gray, Charles Darwin, and the Making of American Botany.) Free and open to the public, Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street. Part of the Asa Gray Bicentennial series.

Darwin’s “Abominable Mystery” and the Search for the First Flowering Plants
Lecture by William (Ned) Friedman
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 6:00 PM
Charles Darwin was baffled by many big questions in evolutionary biology, and none more so than the mystery of how the planet’s first flowering plants came to be. Join William (Ned) Friedman, newly appointed Director of the Arnold Arboretum and Professor in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard, for an exploration into the evolutionary origin of flowering plants, and how recent advances in the fossil record have shed new light on what they may have looked like, where they “lived,” and how they reproduced. Free and open to the public, Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street.

Thoreau as Climatologist: Tracking 160 Years of Climate Change
Lecture with Charles Davis
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 6:00 PM
Over 160 years ago, Henry David Thoreau initiated a study of flowering times at Walden Pond. Today, a research team including, Charles Davis, Assistant Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and Curator in the Harvard Herbarium, has updated Thoreau’s records with current data and integrated them with modern evolutionary biology to reveal how climate change and earlier flowering times have affected Walden’s plants. Those that have greatly declined include many charismatic native wildflower species, while those that have thrived include many nonnative and invasive species. Davis will explore how an integration of historical records combined and cutting edge science can help us potentially mitigate the impacts of climate change on biodiversity. Free and open to the public, Geological Lecture Hall, 24 Oxford Street.
Image of Charles Davis courtesy of Harvard University News Office.

Drawing Plants and Flowers A workshop for adults
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 16, 9:30 AM – 12:30 PM
Explore the beauty and diversity of the plant kingdom through the medium of pencil and paper. Taught by artist and educator Erica Beade, this half-day workshop will introduce botanical drawing techniques through close observation and exercises in contour, gesture, foreshortening and shading. All skill levels are welcome. Advanced registration required.

Grow, Eat, Learn: Members family program at the Harvard Community Garden
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 11:00 AM – 1:00 PM
RAIN DATE: SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 26
Harvard and the local community are creating and maintaining a vegetable garden in the heart of Harvard Square. Explore the basics of plant and soil science with Harvard Professor Donald Pfister; learn about sustainable urban agriculture with Kathleen Frith of Harvard’s Center for Health and the Global Environment; hear growing tips from students; and get your hands dirty harvesting your crops. Bring a bag lunch to enjoy with your harvest. Location: 27 Holyoke Place in Harvard Square. Pre-registration required. RSVP to members@oeb.harvard.edu or call 617.496.6972. Learn more about membership in the museum.

Walking Tour of Mount Auburn Cemetery: Members Tour with Donald Pfister
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 9, 9:00 AM
RAIN DATE: SUNDAY, OCTOBER 10
Asa Gray’s central role in establishing Harvard as the botanical center of North America can be appreciated through the impressive landscape, history, and flora of the Mount Auburn Cemetery. Join Donald Pfister, Asa Gray Professor of Botany and Director of the Harvard Herbaria, for a tour of Mount Auburn Cemetery, site of Gray’s grave and the Asa Gray Garden, and other sites of interest, including the monument to the lost members of the United States Exploring Expedition, Louis Agassiz’s grave, and numerous horticultural gems. Space is limited. Pre-registration required. RSVP to members@oeb.harvard.edu or 617.496.6972. Learn more about membership in the museum.

Archives of Natural History Vol. 37, No. 2, October 1, 2010

Some items of interest from the October 2010 issue of Archives of Natural History:

Darwin’s historical sketch – an American predecessor: C. S. Rafinesque, C. T. Ambrose

Edward Forbes (1815–1854) and the exhibition of natural order in Edinburgh, Geoffrey N. Swinney

Early copies of the first edition of Origin of species in Australia, A. M. Lucas

Alfred Russel Wallace notes 2: the spelling “Russel”, and Wallace’s date of birth, Charles H. Smith, James Williams, Jonathan Stephens, and George Beccaloni

Free Science Days at OMSI, August 12-15

If you are in the Portland area, or have family/friends who are, inform them of this event at OMSI!

Young Darwin Prize (UK)

UPDATE: Winners of first Young Darwin Prize announced

Young Darwin Prize

From NHM/IYB:

Young Darwin Prize

The Young Darwin Prize is a competition to find the best nature news videos.

If your school or community group is doing something practical to conserve biodiversity, why not make a short news report about it and enter our competition?

There are two entry categories; ages 7–11 years (Key Stage 2 or equivalent) and ages 11–14 years (Key Stage 3 or equivalent).

Groups of up to 10 children submit a short video, no longer than two and a half minutes, reporting on a local biodiversity project.

Entries can be uploaded and viewed on the competition website from 22 May 2010. The closing date is31 August 2010.

Our panel of experts will judge the entries and the winners will be announced in October.

The first prize is £500 for the winning group in each age category to visit to a local biodiversity site of special interest and class copies of a biodiversity book. Winners will be invited to a VIP event at the Natural History Museum to collect their prize and present their film. They will also go on a behind-the-scenes tour and meet a Museum scientist. Second prizes are class copies of a biodiversity book, free exhibition tickets and the opportunity to meet a Museum scientist.

The Young Darwin Prize is organised by the Natural History Museum, supported by Defra.



OMSI

Today I started my internship at OMSI with the Einstein exhibit. Learn more about what I will be doing here. Not much else to say right now, so I’ll just plug OMSI’s events for older folks:

Ismo!

I learned today at the volunteer/intern orientation that in the olden days (1950s), the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry had a spaceman mascot, named Ismo (OMSI backwards).

Ismo (click on image for source of photo)

Science is fun, Ismo! But who needs such a silly-looking mascot when OMSI has its own astronaut and OMSI kid:

Michael Barratt, OMSI kid

Barratt, I should note, has ties with The HMS Beagle Project.

Wednesday we leave for a trip to California to see both of our families and a few days in Yosemite National Park (I’ve never been), and I will start interning at OMSI in mid-June, with the Einstein exhibit coming later in that month. In the meantime, I’ve some Tyndall letters to finish up, and reading Walter Isaacson’s Einstein: His Life and Universe.

Exhibit Review for “Darwin the Geologist” (Cambridge, UK)

Darwin the Geologist

Last summer, when I was viewing an exhibit about Darwin and geology at the Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences in Cambridge, England, I did not think I would be reviewing it for the Journal of the History of Biology. But I have, and it is now up online:

Exhibit Review: Darwin the Geologist, The Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, England. Opened July 2009, Permanent. Curator: Francis Neary. Supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Opened in 1904 in memory of the geologist Adam Sedgwick, and containing the collections Sedgwick and John Woodward had previously accumulated, the Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences houses a vast collection of geological and paleontological specimens, including some collected by Darwin himself during the voyage of the HMS Beagle. The Sedgwick acts as a fitting locale, then, for an exhibit exploring Darwin and his geological work. Darwin the Geologist, a permanent exhibit opened in July 2009 to coincide with Cambridge’s Darwin anniversary celebrations, evolved from a temporary exhibit at the museum that had been titled Charles Darwin – Becoming a Geologist and had been on display from September 2008 to June 2009.

Darwin the Geologist tells the story of Darwin’s career as a geologist, displaying not only some of the 1,500 of Darwin’s actual specimens that the Sedgwick holds, but also books, geological tools, maps, and even a pistol carried by Darwin on the Beagle. The exhibit is an exploration of the development of Darwin’s ideas about the Earth and how they related to the development of his theory of evolution by natural selection. Darwin is more commonly labeled as a naturalist, or biologist, because of his work on evolution, but as Sandra Herbert has convincingly shown in Charles Darwin, Geologist (Cornell University Press, 2005), he was a self-proclaimed geologist and pursued his interests in geology in many ways from the Beagle voyage (1831–1836) leading up to the publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859. Geology, as an exhibit label attests, dominated Darwin’s early scientific career, and his ‘‘reputation as a scientist was built on his training as a geologist.’’

Situated among the beautiful and tall glass and wooden display cases, Darwin the Geologist fills one end of the museum’s two-winged gallery, replacing what used to be displays about the Holocene epoch. The exhibit displays are organized chronologically, beginning with Darwin’s childhood fascination with collecting and into his education at Edinburgh, where Darwin was introduced to geology, and Cambridge, where Darwin met John Stevens Henslow and gained collecting and field-work experience on a geological field excursion to Wales with Adam Sedgwick. More displays are devoted to the Beagle voyage, as this afforded Darwin more opportunities to practice geology and to think about the forces that created the landscapes he visited. We learn about a raised coastline at Sa˜o Tiago in the Cape Verde Islands and the numerous fossils Darwin discovered, including the famous Megatherium; of the geology of the Andes and the formation of igneous rocks at the Galapagos Islands; and the growth of coral reefs in the Pacific. We learn about Syms Covington, Darwin’s assistant during and after the voyage, and the many specialists to whom Darwin farmed out his geological specimens for identification: William Miller for minerals, Robert Brown for fossil plants, Alcide D’Orbigny for fossil shells, Richard Owen for fossil mammals, and William Clift for the fossil teeth of Megatherium. We are shown how Darwin became a member and later secretary of the Geological Society of London as a result of his geological work on the Beagle.

A label reflecting on Archibald Geikie’s centenary celebration lecture in Cambridge (1909) [Charles Darwin as Geologist: The Rede Lecture, Given at the Darwin Centennial Commemoration on 24 June 1909 (Cambridge Library Collection – Life Sciences)] about Darwin’s geology—‘‘Since 1909 Darwin’s theory of evolution has played an increasingly important role in our understanding of life on Earth, while his geological theories have been largely forgotten’’—segues between Darwin’s own life and work and labels showing how more recent scientists have used Darwin’s collections and ideas in their geological work. For example, geologist Lyall Anderson studies rocks from the Beagle collection to consider Darwin’s collecting practices. Darwin received some specimens as gifts from other geologists, such as Andrew Smith. Through studying the rocks themselves, Anderson has been able to conclude that Darwin included in his collection specimens he did not collect himself. Similar research by Sally Gibson has helped to understand Darwin’s geological route on the island of Santiago in the Galapagos. While the Beagle collection is of importance to scientists, the specimens can help to answer questions important to historians of science as well. Darwin the Geologist stresses this point. Anderson is quoted in a label: ‘‘From a personal point of view I think my biggest surprise was that Darwin didn’t collect everything himself. Maybe that’s a misconception that the Darwin Industry has kept running.’’ While Darwin is surely an important figure, lesser-known figures in the work brought Darwin his scientific fame.

Smaller displays between the larger glass cases emphasize other aspects of Darwin’s geology. From the influences of Alexander von Humboldt and Charles Lyell to the letter of introduction inviting Darwin to join the Beagle, these displays flesh out the story and provide contextual information. Several consider various practices associated with geology, such as how to collect appropriate specimens, the use of field notebooks, and the analysis and interpretation of specimens, and how this work for Darwin resulted in various publications. Some of the smaller displays discuss Darwin’s ‘‘scientific failure’’ in theorizing how the Parallel Roads of Glen Roy in Scotland were formed, how geology figured into On the Origin of Species, and how Darwin continued to study geological topics after the publication of Origin, most notably with earthworms and the formation of soil, the subject of his last book. Also included in the exhibit are a recreation of Darwin’s cabin on the Beagle and an interactive globe showing the places where Darwin collected particular specimens. A touchscreen allows visitors to go behind the scenes of the exhibit, which is essentially a collection of the posts from the blog that accompanies Darwin the Geologist and is accessible at http://darwinthegeologist.org/.

The exhibit does a fine job of placing Darwin’s work in the context of geological questions at the time. It does not address the ‘‘Genesis and geology’’ dispute in the nineteenth century beyond one label stating that ‘‘Heated debate and controversy over science and religion captured the public imagination,’’ nor is there a label stressing the importance of correspondence to scientific practice. These minor quibbles aside, Darwin the Geologist offers a wealth of interesting material in both the objects on display and the accompanying labels, and it does it in a rather small space. It is a well-organized exhibit, and includes a wonderful artistic tribute to Darwin. While a life-size bronze of a young Darwin, by Cambridge alum and zoologist-turned-artist Anthony Smith, now adorns a garden in Christ’s College at Cambridge, a bronze bust also by Smith oversees Darwin the Geologist as if to suggest that Darwin himself is either the epitome of humankind (for Darwin is situated at the most recent end of the geological and paleontological timescale that is the Sedgwick Museum) or a typical specimen of humankind. The former runs the risk of claims of hagiography. The latter is more likely, as the exhibit suggests that scientific discovery follows from curiosity, and Darwin the Geologist surely expresses throughout to its visitors the act of scientific discovery. If nothing else, the statues help to emphasize that for much of the work that made Darwin a reputable scientist, he was an energetic young man eager to explore the world around him, not always the long-bearded sage of Downe.

Michael D. Barton
Montana State University

The photos I took of the exhibit can be seen here.