Science is the Reason for the Season
IF someone would like to write some show notes for us, I will be more than happy to use them in place of the measly ones you see below.
In the show this week: Dark Matter Detected in a Dark Mine? Is Santa bad for our health? Or, is it the media? Getting Santa Drunk. It's TWISmas, not Halloween, but ghosts of mountains past are being explored! Cellphones remind us why we need science in this TWISmas time. And, much more...
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It's TWISmas time! And, if you remember from last week, we have a special giveaway thanks to Evolvems. We're giving away a special Evolvem plush toy this week to Justina and Angela for these great TWISmas tales...
Dashing through Kigoma
Dashing through KigomaChasing after chimps
Trying to find a fecal sample
So I can gather it.
Collecting all my data
Each minute that tick tocks
Man it can be grueling
But science really rocks!
Oh grad student, grad student
Making science waves
Working on some new research
For this TWISmas day.
Grad student, grad student
Future science nerd
Making sure the messages
Of evolutionary biology are heard. YAY!
Darwin of TWISmas Past
I didn‘t want a lot for TWISmas,
There was just one thing I dreamed about,
I didn‘t care about the fossils
Or anything that science found –
I just wanted the red-bellied Claus
To slide my chimney at night
And turn me into a flying unicorn!
So I could join his deers in flight.
To my defense it can be said
That it was many years ago,
And nothing much was yet in my head.
But I had the desire to grow
Into a shiny flying unicorn!
And so I went to school to learn how
Only in the new light to be born
Into a scientist-to-be somehow.
And then the glorious star of education
Started shining like energy-save bulb.
I started following it with no vacation
For my hungry brain. I joined the club –
I followed Newton, Mendell and Einstein;
But still my dream lived on –
While all the knowledge was fine,
I wanted to be a unicorn!
But everyone would say
(Less and less patiently to a varying degree)
That there was no way!
But I needed the argument explained to me!
I was told that it was how people were created,
And nothing would ever change.
I thought that there were things to be debated,
But the bell rang TWISmas break.
And so I went home on the night before TWISmas,
Snuggled up in bed, and was fast asleep,
When I heard a whooshing sound, and sitting up
I saw the Grandfather Darwin from the deep
Of Christmas past. He explained
How species come to be and evolution works.
And I listened, my breath bated,
Waiting to find out if I could be a unicorn!
But Grandfather Darwin went on to tell
How every individual is born with slight variations,
And they survive more or less well.
Those that reproduce pass on their adaptations,
Which takes years and years and years.
And that is how species change and form.
The evidence is all around out there!
To survive you have to be strong
And to adapt to the conditions.
That is how useful traits remain:
Some have the predisposition
To become another‘s prey...
And so a new picture appeared
In my mind: species fell in their places
On the huge Earth family tree.
Grandpa Darwin vanished without traces.
I cuddled up and fell asleep,
Happy that it was all in my head.
Shout-outs to...
Patrick Ford, Tony Steele, Ed Martin, Doug Perry, Rob Maskrey, Rob McCabe, James Hulsey, Travis Hale, Stu Sotozaki-Leech, Brian Chance, Mark Sherman, Ed Dyer, Jeff Peterson, Louis Bookbinder, Logan Waterman, Shannan Mortimer, Dylan Combelick and Dale Fisher for sending in a story about movies of photons, Sherman Dorn, and Leif Andersen
All the best and many more this TWISmas season!!!
Music this week was by Unbalanced Wheel, Jonathan Coulton, TMBG, and The Gifted Apes.
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current science news posted by Kirsten at 12/22/2009 10:34:00 AM
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