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Plastic Eating Worms and Scientists Running for Office: Thursday Afternoon Dredging, August 16th, 2018

Posted on August 16, 2018 By David Shiffman
Uncategorized

Cuttings (short and sweet): 

  • Follow underwater engineer Amy Kukulya, as seen on Shark Week, on twitter! (And have you seen my review of Shark Week 2018?)
  • Marine worms are eating plastic now. By Michael Allen, for Hakai Magazine.
  • Predatory coral bring down jellyfish by working together. From MongaBay news updates.

Spoils (long reads and deep dives):

  • Canada is flying blind into Arctic Conservation. By Cody Dey, for the Narwhal, about research I’m a coauthor on (Cody is lead author). We’re excited about this paper, which, among other things, shows major gaps in the research and understanding of many Arctic fishes. This is a big problem as Arctic fishing is only going to increase in frequency.
  • Are narwhals starting to go extinct? By Matt K. Smith, for the Daily Beast
  • Tax havens shield companies responsible for deforestation and overfishing. By Fiona Harvey, for the Guardian.
  • Shifting baselines: another threat to coral reefs. By Todd Woody, for OceansDeeply.
  • Florida’s gulf coast battles smelly, deadly red tide. By Greg Allen, for NPR.

Plumbing the depths (discussion):

  • An unprecedented number of scientists are running for elected office in the United States this year… but is that a good thing? I do not see how an elected official who is a trained scientist will be a stronger advocate for science than an elected official who has a good scientific advisor that they listen to, and the latter has many advantages over a scientist. (Obviously a scientist in office is better for science than an anti-science idealogue). What do you think? Let us know in the comments!  And check out Maggie Koerth-Baker‘s excellent in-depth article about this for 538.

Please add your own cuttings and spoils in the comments!

If you appreciate my shark research and conservation outreach, please consider supporting me on Patreon! Any amount is appreciated, and supporters get exclusive rewards!

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Related

Tags: arctic arctic vertebrates cody dey coral deforestation Florida red tide jellyfish narwhals ocean plastic overfishing plastic red tide scientist running for office shifting baselines tax haven

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