Popular Culture – Page 13 – Southern Fried Science

A brief, poorly researched, history of amphibious vehicles

June 22, 2012 Andrew Thaler

James Bond had them. Baltimore’s inner harbor has them. Mitt Romney is probably building one for each of his moon mansions. From the Alligator Tug to the Boston Duck Boats, amphibious vehicles have been with us for more than a century. Which is why it’s strange to see a headline, dated June 21st, 2012, touting “WORLD’S FIRST AMPHIBIOUS CAR REVEALED“.

Now, if we want to strictly limit ourselves to production line, non-military, non-commercial vehicles (so no decommissioned beach landers or custom fanboat VW bugs), than the first amphibious vehicle was probably the Amphibicar, way back in 1965:

Amphicar im Main, am Eisernen Steg in Ffm via Wikimedia Commons

Notoriously leaky, not entirely stable, but still pretty swank. If Romney ever finishes building his moon mansion’s moon ocean pool for amphibious moon cars, he’ll join the ranks of former president Lyndon Johnson, who also owned an Amphibicar.

Wolf conservation and negative media portrayals: A panel discussion about “The Grey” with wolf experts

February 29, 2012February 29, 2012 David Shiffman 3 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture

The recently-released movie “The Grey” tells the story of a pack of wolves that hunts the survivors of a plane crash. In addition to both being the subject of inaccurate and negative media portrayals, wolves and sharks share many ecological similarities (sharks have been called “the wolves of the sea”). A panel of wolf scientists and conservation experts agreed to answer my questions about these animals and their thoughts on how “The Grey” might impact their conservation.

Dr. Sylvia Fallon is a senior scientist with the Natural Resources Defense Council. She has worked for the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the National Park Service.

DeLene Beland is an independent science writer whose work has been featured by the Charlotte Observer, Earth Magazine, and Wildlife in North Carolina. She blogs at Wild Muse, and is the author of an upcoming book about wolves in the Eastern United States.

Cristina Eisenberg is a Ph.D. student at Oregon State University. Her dissertation focuses on the ecological effects of the loss of wolves from forest ecosystems.

This is what a Marine Invertebrate Zoology class looks like.

February 7, 2012February 7, 2012 Andrew Thaler 2 Comments

Popular Culture, Science

The last few weeks have seen a groundswell of support for Kevin Zelnio’s #IamScience movement, what began as a single, incredibly heartfelt post and twitter hashtag evolved into a series of personal reflections, a somber music video, and a tumbler and Facebook page, all with the unifying message that there is no traditional path through science, only … Read More “This is what a Marine Invertebrate Zoology class looks like.” »

San Diego Demon? This ain’t my first trip down Possum Trot Road

February 2, 2012February 2, 2012 Andrew Thaler 10 Comments

Popular Culture

Ever since we started tackling marine cryptids (not to be confused with real cryptic species) during our annual Week of Ocean Pseudoscience, people occasionally e-mail me with new “rotting rodent” style monsters. This news story – Behold: The San Diego Demonoid – has been making the twitter and e-mails rounds today. Like the Montauk Monster a few years back, a waterlogged, decomposed critter washed up on a beach, this time in San Diego, and people unfamiliar with what decomposing varmints look like branded it some sort of cryptid. To the right is the uncredited photo (now credited to Josh Menard) that’s been cropping up in various corners of the internet. Like many “cryptic critter” photos leaked to the press, the ones associated with this story fail to show the entire animal or provide any sense of scale. That should be red flag #1 that it is, in fact, a common local resident that is being dressed up to appear more monstrous than it really is.

Now, I’m not a marsupial specialists, but I’ve seen my fair share of possums (Opposums for our non-southern readers) in all states of decay, so those nasty teeth immediately clued me in. Here’s a possum skull (from a Virginia possum) for comparisons:

Saving Nemo: 1 out of 6 species that appear in Finding Nemo are threatened with extinction

December 12, 2011December 13, 2011 David Shiffman 3 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture, Science

Nemo edited — WhySharksMatter found Nemo at Disney's Living Seas Aquarium

Like most marine biology geeks, I’m a huge fan of Disney/Pixar’s “Finding Nemo”. In addition to a heartwarming story of a father trying to bring his son home to their aneme…anemeneme… amenememe… anemone, the film showcases an enormous variety of beautiful real-life coral reef species. According to research published today in Conservation Letters, however, we may soon only be able to see some of these animals in the movies. The paper, titled “Extinction Risk and Bottlenecks in the Conservation of Charismatic Marine Species”, concluded that many of the stars of Finding Nemo are in deep trouble.

Are Neutrinos really faster than light? Irish folk rock parody band weighs in.

November 27, 2011December 9, 2011 Andrew Thaler

Popular Culture, Science

From the same people who brought us the eminently catchy “There’s no one as Irish as Barack O’Bama.” Quoth Ger Corrigan “for the moment we are backing Albert and his theory, I’m no Einstein but he was.” The Neutrino Song: httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpMY84T8WY0

Check out Shark Attack Experiment Live, Friday on National Geographic Wild

November 23, 2011December 9, 2011 David Shiffman

Popular Culture, Science

This Friday, tune in to National Geographic Wild for a day of sharks! Starting at noon, they will air a series of shark documentaries culminating at 9 p.m. with “Shark Attack Experiment: Live“. This show, aired live from the shark hotspot of South Africa, aims to test some common myths about shark attacks and to “to … Read More “Check out Shark Attack Experiment Live, Friday on National Geographic Wild” »

Overfishing Rap Battle – Dead and Gone

November 11, 2011December 9, 2011 Andrew Thaler 1 Comment

Popular Culture

So I’m sitting in my office revising a manuscript when Dr. Bik over at Deep Sea News dropped some serious overfishing beats on me. In case you thought there was only one overfishing themed rap parody video out there, we’ve got some news for you: httpv://youtu.be/AZr9nWfips4 Warning: video contains some graphic footage of sea turtle and shark … Read More “Overfishing Rap Battle – Dead and Gone” »

in which four environmental scientists play Oilsprings of Catan, destroy world

November 7, 2011December 9, 2011 Andrew Thaler 2 Comments

Conservation, Popular Culture

Catan: Oilsprings. image by Andrew Thaler

This weekend I assembled a small team of marine and environmental scientists, including a molecular ecologist, a human geographer with experience in environmental justice, a political ecologist with experience in common-pool resource theory, and a veteran of the US Commission on Ocean Policy with extensive experience in marine spatial planning, to test out the new expansion for Settlers of Catan, Catan: Oilsprings. Settlers of Catan is a popular and expansive board game that focuses on resource management, development, and trading. Oilsprings is designed to add an element of “Tragedy of the Commons” to the game by introducing a new resource, oil, which allows rapid development, but at a cost that affects all players.

The indelible stamp – Scientists and their tattoos

November 1, 2011December 9, 2011 Andrew Thaler 5 Comments

Popular Culture, Science

How do you declare your undying love for science? How do you immortalize your doctoral dissertation? How can you let the world know about your eternal love affair with tardigrades, Euler’s Identity, caffeine, or the voyager spacecraft? If you answered any of these with “get a tattoo!” than you’ve probably already heard about Science Ink: Tattoo’s of the Science Obsessed, by Carl Zimmer.

Over the last several years, Zimmer has been compiling scientists’ tattoos at the Science Tattoo Emporium, which now contains 255 pieces of ink. In Science Ink, Zimmer has selected the best looking, most memorable tattoos from his online collection and published them in a beautiful book featuring both artwork and insight into each piece.

Zimmer is among the best of the “science communicators”, those who distill the essence of important concepts into comprehensible units. Each tattoo come with either a description of the story behind its origin, its meaning to the canvas, or the fundamentals of the concept it represents. The book covers an extensive range of topics, from mathematics to natural history to physics and astronomy. When I first heard about this project, I was expecting a coffee-table style book of tattoo photographs, but it is much more than that. The tattoos are simply prompts for a deeper exploration into the meaning of science to society, as well as a delightful collection of (very) short stories about individuals experience in science.