The Farmer Hypothesis

The farmer hypothesis, on the other hand, has the flavor of a horror story: Every morning on a turkey farm, the farmer comes to feed the turkeys. A scientist turkey, having observed this pattern to hold without change for almost a year, makes the following discovery: “Every morning at eleven, food arrives.” On the morning of Thanksgiving, the scientist announces this law to the other turkeys. But that morning at eleven, food doesn’t arrive; instead, the farmer comes and kills the entire...

 Ode to the Mediterranean Sea

Who that has ever visited the borders of this classic sea, has not felt at the first sight of its waters a glow of reverent rapture akin to devotion, and an instinctive sensation of thanksgiving at being permitted to stand before these hallowed waves? All that concerns the Mediterranean is of the deepest interest to civilized man, for the history of its progress is the history of the development of the world; the memory of the great men who have lived and died around its banks; the recollecti...

 Examples of Species Evolved through Human Artificial Sele...

The dog can stand for the success of other breeding programs. As Darwin noted in The Origin, “Breeders habitually speak of an animal’s organization as something quite plastic, which they can model almost as they please.” Cows, sheep, pigs, flowers, vegetables, and so on—all came from humans choosing variants present in wild ancestors, or variants that arose by mutation during domestication. Through selection, the svelte wild turkey has become our docile, meaty, and virtually tasteless...