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| Credit: gailhampshire |
So the largest taxon (below class level) are the beetles, with about 450,000 described species. Hence the famous quip "God loves beetles". But guess what? The largest family is the weevil family (60,000 described species). So God doesn´t just love beetles, he very specifically loves *snout* beetles?!
The world, agent Cooper, is a strange and beautiful place.
These were my midnight musings last night, but I didn´t have time to jot
them down until now. Because I was sleeping it off, obviously! LOL.
The quip “God loves beetles” is intended as a jocular jibe against Christianity
from an atheist-scientific perspective. There are currently 400,000 described
species of beetles. When the quip was quipped (around 1968), I believe the
number was 250,000. The point being that beetles are the single largest taxon.
Therefore, God must love beetles. I mean, why did he create so many species of Coleoptera
otherwise? And since Anglican clergymen would presumably find this deeply embarrassing,
it´s excellent atheist rhetoric. Or something.
But is it really? Paul said that all of Nature awaits the arrival of the
sons of God, and then Nature will be redeemed. So why can´t Paul´s God love Insecta?
I mean, where were *you* when He created the bombardier beetle? Medieval Catholicism
had a crypto-Neoplatonist tendency, in which all of reality was seen (almost
panentheistically) as a gigantic chain of being. C S Lewis probably had the
same perspective. I can see him laughing at the smart aleck atheists over a
pint of beer at the Prancing Pony. “Yes, the beetles, well, I always wondered
about that one myself”. Why can´t a god “constrained” by Neoplatonist “Forms” create
a lot of beetles? But sure, I suppose it´s hard to explain why a Protestant god
created 400,000 species of Coleoptera, since he seems to have an inordinate
fondness for humans (or at least some of them)…
Other religions presumably have even less issues with the accursed bugs.
In Islam, I presume Allah can create more or less anything at any time, just to
show his omnipotence to humans as a kind of “teaching device”. And in Hinduism,
Shiva creates beetles as he goes along, as part of his crazy dance, simply
because he can (I suppose Kali or even Krishna could do the same!).
So what´s the problem really?
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| A guy with ideas that offend |
OK, I can´t let this one go...
The bizarre thing with the Woke is that they use "safe space" euphemisms even when discussing fascism and Nazism. It´s like a sick joke. Maybe it is?
Bro, Mussolini´s fascism wasn´t "an idea that offends". Nor does the name Hitler "have an objectionable sound to modern ears". Nor were Adolph and Benito simply "controversial figures". Geezus. The Nazis were genocidal maniacs, for crying out loud!
And why is Beyoncé mentioned in the same headline as Duce and der Führer?
They are laughing at us. I´m offended by the euphemisms. Can I file a complaint with the HR department?
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| A beetle named after Adolf Hitler(!) Credit: Michael Munich |
I´m not entirely surprised that this happens, tbh, but I kind of hoped that the conservative character of scientific names (they are *supposed* to be unchangable) would stop the Wokies in this particular case.
But naaah, apparently not. That being said, if these are the new rules...well...a number of organisms are named after Greta Thunberg. I´m sure Israelis and Jews might find *that* offensive. Just as offensive as name a living creature after, say, Hitler or Mussolini. Let´s see if somebody is brave enough to mount a challenge!
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| Credit: Bugboy52.40 |
Lite lustigt att *den här* sajten skriver om skalbaggar på Madagaskar. Djupekologi? Metafor? Något om "generalister" versus "endemiska arter"? Fast ibland betyder "skalbagge" faktiskt "skalbagge"...
Femton nya arter hittade på Madagaskar
A very interesting article from The Guardian...
From the article:
>>>Emily Standen is a scientist at the University of Ottawa, who studies Polypterus senegalus, AKA the Senegal bichir, a fish that not only has gills but also primitive lungs. Regular polypterus can breathe air at the surface, but they are “much more content” living underwater, she says. But when Standen took Polypterus that had spent their first few weeks of life in water, and subsequently raised them on land, their bodies began to change immediately. The bones in their fins elongated and became sharper, able to pull them along dry land with the help of wider joint sockets and larger muscles. Their necks softened. Their primordial lungs expanded and their other organs shifted to accommodate them. Their entire appearance transformed. “They resembled the transition species you see in the fossil record, partway between sea and land,” Standen told me. According to the traditional theory of evolution, this kind of change takes millions of years. But, says Armin Moczek, an extended synthesis proponent, the Senegal bichir “is adapting to land in a single generation”. He sounded almost proud of the fish.
>>>Moczek’s own area of expertise is dung beetles, another remarkably plastic species. With future climate change in mind, he and his colleagues tested the beetles’ response to different temperatures. Colder weather makes it harder for the beetles to take off. But the researchers found that they responded to these conditions by growing larger wings. The crucial thing about such observations, which challenge the traditional understanding of evolution, is that these sudden developments all come from the same underlying genes. The species’s genes aren’t being slowly honed, generation by generation. Rather, during its early development it has the potential to grow in a variety of ways, allowing it to survive in different situations. “We believe this is ubiquitous across species,” says David Pfennig of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Japanese Buddhist version of the Hindu goddess Lakshmi, known as Kisshoten.
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OK, closing for tonight!
If God is real, personal and loves beetles, He should stop this crazed heathens AT ONCE with a thunderbolt or other celestial weapon of his choice!!!
"Megafires: The Global Threat" is a two-part Franco-American documentary from 2020 about the recent wave of forest fires in North America, but also other parts of the world. I just finished watching the first part, and it frankly made me feel almost depressed! Yes, it´s man-made climate change all over again.
The number and intensity of forest fires is growing by the year, fires can start even in December (so there is no distinct "forest fire season" anymore), and is only going to get worse for various reasons connected to climate change. For instance, snow is thawing rapidly, making it difficult for trees to absorb the water before it leaves the forest eco-system. At the same time, with each degree of warming, trees need more water, not less (about 20% more). The drought makes the trees less able to defend themselves against attacks from insects such as the ash borer, and dead trees of course make excellent fuel for forest fires...
In 1910, an enormous forest fire known as the Big Burn affected four US states, making the US authorities decide that forest fires were a virtual "public enemy number one". From around 1935 to 1985, American fire fighters *did* succesfully stop almost every forest fire in the country. However, from 1985 onwards, the number of forest fires have been rising very steeply. The reason, according to the scientists interviewed, is that the lack of forest fires have made the forest more dense, with more trees and vegetation in general, and hence more "fuel" once a fire really gets started. Before the 1930´s, fires in effect regulated the size and thickness of the forests, being part of the natural system. The succesful suppression of forest fires turned out to be a pyrrhic victory, especially with global warming added to the mix.
And then there´s the peat...
The documenatry claims that the peat deposits contain 25% of the world´s carbon. More forest fires means more peat will burn, especially in areas such as Alaska, Siberia or Scandinavia, where global warming is more rapid than in the rest of the world. Peat fires can go on for months without being detected, since they can take place literally underground. "The earth itself is on fire". The team goes to Indonesia, where a scientist tells them that a local peat fire wasn´t stopped by three heavy rainfalls.
Still, the most scary part of "Megafires" was the - wait for it - pyrocumulonimbus, a kind of monster cloud that forms during really severe forest fires and creates its own local weather system, complete with thunderstorms. The cloud can therefore spread the wildfire even further, almost as if the fire had a bizarre life of its own!
Is this how the world ends, I wonder?
In the second part of this production (which I haven´t seen yet), we will supposedly learn about the solutions to the above predicament. Well, I certainly hope there are some, because from where I stand, it does not look good...
It seems I forgot to link to this extremely important piece of news. God loves beetles. And Swedish girlz with an attitude?
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