07 MAR 2015 by ideonexus
Questioning Air Pollution
How should a living organism live?
When spring arrives, you open your doors, the wind blows in. The smell of flowers fills the airand colors come back to lifeSometimes when it rains or when it’s foggy out. You can’t help but breathe the air deep into your lungs and experience the feeling of small water droplets filling them up. Both piercingly cold but also pure and fresh.
In autumn, you would spend a whole afternoon with a loved one doing absolutely nothing, basking lazily in the sun.... 1 
notes
notes09 AUG 2014 by ideonexus
Plants as Modified by Man
Ever since science overthrew the idea of spontaneous generation and established beyond doubt that no organism could have existence without a parent cell, the scientific world received a thunderbolt which was to be means of its' first great awakening. And as the message was heralded from one to another it arroused more careful investigation, stimulated advanced thought and opened up a new line of possibilities respecting the whole plant kingdom.
Man did not grope as hitherto in the dark trust...Folksonomies: history artificial selection
Folksonomies: history artificial selection
1 notes
notes12 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
The Ideal of Collaboration
In a University we are especially bound to recognise not only the unity of science itself, but the communion of the workers in science. We are too apt to suppose that we are congregated here merely to be within reach of certain appliances of study, such as museums and laboratories, libraries and lecturers, so that each of us may study what he prefers. I suppose that when the bees crowd round the flowers it is for the sake of the honey that they do so, never thinking that it is the dust which ...Folksonomies: collectivism collaboration
Folksonomies: collectivism collaboration
1 notes
notesWe think of scientists at universities and laboratories as working for a greater good, but, in reality, they are like bees in a hive gathering honey without thought to the larger picture.
15 DEC 2011 by ideonexus
Fractal Geometry Changes One's Perspective of the World
Fractal geometry will make you see everything differently. There is a danger in reading further. You risk the loss of your childhood vision of clouds, forests, flowers, galaxies, leaves, feathers, rocks, mountains, torrents of water, carpet, bricks, and much else besides. Never again will your interpretation of these things be quite the same. Folksonomies: perspective fractals
Folksonomies: perspective fractals
1 notes
notesYou see fractals in much of the natural world after learning of them.
13 DEC 2011 by ideonexus
Men of Sciences as Experimentors or Dogmatists
Those who have handled sciences have been either men of experiment or men of dogmas. The men of experiment are like the ant; they only collect and use; the reasoners resemble spiders, who make cobwebs out of their own substance. But the bee takes a middle course; it gathers its material from the flowers of the garden and of the field, but transforms and digests it by a power of its own. Not unlike this is the true business of philosophy; for it neither relies solely or chiefly on the powers o...Folksonomies: science scientists
Folksonomies: science scientists
1 notes
notesFrancis Bacon describes them as ants and spiders and lays out a third way using the metaphor of the bee.
20 SEP 2011 by ideonexus
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... 1 notes
notesTurkeys, corn, broccoli, tomatoes, etc, etc, all bred from wild species into their modern domesticated forms.
25 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
Parable of the Scientist as Insect
Those who have handled sciences have been either men of experiment or men of dogmas. The men of experiment are like the ant, they only collect and use; the reasoners resemble spiders, who make cobwebs out of their own substance. But the bee takes a middle course: it gathers its material from the flowers of the garden and of the field, but transforms and digests it by a power of its own. Not unlike this is the true business of philosophy; for it neither relies solely or chiefly on the powers o...
1 Scientists work like ants, spiders, and bees.
03 MAY 2011 by ideonexus
Hummingbirds are Proof of the Cost of Sex
If sex had no cost, hummingbirds would not exist. Hummingbirds eat nectar, which is produced by flowers to lure pollinating insects and birds. Nectar is a pure gift by the plant of its hard-won sugar to the hummingbird, a gift given only because the hummingbird will then carry pollen to another plant. To have sex with another plant, the first plant must bribe the pollen carrier with nectar. Nectar is therefore a pure, unadulterated cost incurred by the plant in its quest for sex. If sex had n...Plants offer nectar to hummingbirds in exchange for their role in plant sex.
03 JAN 2011 by TGAW
Beauty of Trees As They Whiz By In Transit
The power to recognize trees at a glance without examining their leaves or flowers or fruit as they are seen, for example, from the car-window during a railroad journey, can only be acquired by studying them as they grow under all possible conditions over wide areas of territory. Such an attainment may not have much practical value, but once acquired it gives to the possessor a good deal of pleasure which is denied to less fortunate travelers.Folksonomies: trees
Folksonomies: trees
1 notes
notesCharles Sprague Sargent (1841-1927) points out that once you know trees, even seeing them whiz by on a railroad journey can bring great pleasure to a traveler.
