A Journal of the Irrepressible
Another in our series of educational science videos, this time we visit the Bonneville Fish Hatchery to dive into the mysterious lives of sturgeon. Dr. Sullivan informs us that these ancient creatures, which can live as long as two hundred million years, are in no way related to science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon.
Don’t miss the exciting first episode of Dr. Sullivan’s Science.
A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction (Center for Environmental Structure Series) by Christopher Alexander, Sara Ishikawa, Murray Silverstein
Don’t Sleep, There Are Snakes: Life and Language in the Amazonian Jungle (Vintage Departures) by Daniel L. Everett
Three Days to Never by Tim Powers
On the Origin of Stories: Evolution, Cognition, and Fiction by Brian Boyd
“…live as long as two hundred million years…”
wow, them’s some old fish!
Jay
16 Sep 07 at 6:43 pm
We’ve received some wonderful comments about Episode 2 via email:
Molly M wrote: “that was beautiful. my eyes got watery from laughing so hard!”
Walter H. wrote: “I donno you guys too postmodern/mortem for me!”
Kurt Q wrote: “Fun, fun, fun! I’ll forward to a few select family / friends.
“I’m reminded of what’s his name’s show on Duckbreath Radio Theatre (wasn’t it?) His byline was “I’ve got a MASTER’S degree — in SCIENCE!!” (Was it “Ask Doctor Science”?)
“More substantively, your play on the incredible “longevity” of the sturgeon puts me in mind of recent work by Giles Fauconnier and Mark Turner (_The Way We Think_) in “mental space” / “conceptual integration” / “blending” theory. In their chapter on what they call “compression” in mental integration, they analyze some material from high school science textbooks and from popular science journalism (NYT), in which stages or phases in the life history of a species are compressed and (in some ways) confused with the life history of a single animal. (Examples: the modern pronghorn antelope leaps so wonderfully quickly, even though it has no evident adaptive need for this evasive maneuver, because it is still fleeing the “ghost” of its ancient sabertooth predators. Or the diagram of the dinosaur chasing a winged insect, gradually morphing into a modern bluejay — at which point, having fully taken wing, he finally catches the little bugger.) “
Brian
19 Sep 07 at 3:18 pm
I am in total awe of Dr. Sullivan’s excrementous presentations of science and history! The highly impressive ludicrosity of her sophistry causes my very sides to spasm from uncontrollable cachinnation.
The ebullient genius of Dr. Sullivan has exceeded the paralogisms of even the great Josh Bernstein (formerly) of the History Channel, who recently PROVED that the French Merovingians could not possibly be descendants of Mary Magdalene, since DNA samples from the bones the Germanic queen Aregund (who married one of the last Merovingian kings) had no genomes in common with the Christian population of Israel today. Yes, I was rather stunned by that stupendous logic, but it now pales in light of Dr. Sullivan’s revelations of natural history, which are far more risible from a scientific point of view.
Dr. Sullivan (may I be permitted to call you “Dr. Gwen”?), I bow to you as one of the greats! Dawson’s Piltdown Man, the great works of Ossian, nay even Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “The Coming of the Fairies” cannot hold a candle – even in the bone-like candle holder which you displayed to our amazement – to YOU!
Your fan,
David G.
(a bona fide descendant of the Piltdown Man)
PS: My compliments to your obviously skilled cameraman, who made me believe that I might in fact be watching the History Channel, Discovery, or…Comedy Central….
David
20 Sep 07 at 2:29 pm
We just got back from Long Beach Peninsula and there are NO STURGEON there. How disappointing. We did see herons fishing, but I think sturgeon would make too big a mouthful for them. Perhaps baby ones. Or roe–the poor birds’ caviar?
Alice Christiansen
20 Sep 07 at 4:33 pm