A Sea Without Fish

This book has been out for over a year, but I heard an interview on the radio, WVXU, with the author, David Meyer. He discussed the fantastic fossil hunting we have here in the Cincinnati area. We really do have a great resource for science education right in our backyards, literally. Local group, the Cincinnati Dry Dredgers are doing that today.

Cavemen: Part 2

Here's a follow up to this post concerning the Caveman diet.

Prehistoric life was not short. This is a blessed scientific lie.

We explain this in much more detail in the book, but here's the misunderstanding in a nutshell.

* There was high infant mortality in prehistory. (How this compares to infant mortality in Medeival Europe or modern India and China is an interesting question we look at in the book, but no space for it here.)
* There are technical difficulties in distinguishing age of death beyond the early 30s, when one's last teeth are fully erupted from the jaw bone.
* These two factors combined with sloppy thinking to create the wide-spread "fact" that "if you made it to 30 or so, you had done well."

But it's bullshit! Nobody was considered "old" at 30 in prehistory, just as 30 year-olds aren't considered "old" among modern day hunter-gatherers, or in the Old Testament, where humans were allotted 70 years (three score and ten). People who lived beyond childhood often–even typically–lived into their 60s and 70s in prehistory. The evidence for this is overwhelming, and well known to specialists in anthropology, primatology, and archaeology.

Cavemen

Has anyone else heard of this subculture who try to replicate some aspect of living like a caveman for better health?

It seems highly misguided to me. The idea is that modern man is weak when compared to our primitive ancestors. While that may be true, our ancestors were lucky to live past what we now call middle age. I also find it funny that the practitioners have no problem partaking in modern medicine while thumbing their nose at eating vegetables.

I'd call this a fake, except the world is a strange place and I don't doubt that people would attempt something like this. Still it could be a nice little hoax.

PZ Myers to attend Creation Museum

Apparently PZ Myers will be taking a trip to the Creation Museum in Northern Kentucky this August. No details, yet. PZ has been arguing with Ken Ham recently and challenged him to invite actual scientists to tour the museum for an official review. Could be interesting.

Are Humans Evolving Faster

An interesting story I got from Onegoodmove.org.
I had always wondered whether humans were still evolving through a biological level of natural selection. The argument against would be that society supersedes selection. For instance, a society with remedies for genetic ailments may not naturally select for evolutionary improvements.
This article suggests the opposite with some genomic and observational evidence. They make the point that evolution is faster in larger populations, such as humans today.
http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2009/06/the-past-40000-years-are-human-evolving-faster-a-galaxy-classic.html#more

North American Paleontological Convention

The North American Paleontological Convention will be held in Cincinnati this week. Check The Panda's Thumb for more details. Lots of movers and shakers in the battle against Creationists will be here including Genie Scott and Ken Miller.