Do Ya Think? Blog

Sports, eh? Why bother? The Olympic Games Meet Darwin's Finches.

07/20/2014

Soccer is not important. Football is not important. Neither basketball nor hockey are important. Yes, some are thinking, I am that clueless, or arrogant,or whatever. (Now there's some fine writin' for ya, I'm "whatever.") But, DYT Blog reader, before you categorize me as hopelessly out-of-touch, let me say this: tribalism, now THAT is important. Yes, I both get it, and I don't get it, and no, I'm not a normal guy. Professional sport is the true opiate of the masses. I have been to a few folks houses to see major sporting events, like the Superbowl, but the main reason I go is because I like people, not the sporting event. Personally, I root for the advertisers--they always win.
Buuuut, I do remember watching a sports event many years ago that I really enjoyed. It was an Olympic competition in women's volleyball. One team was the Soviet Union (Yeah, it was that long ago). They were astonishingly tall, amazonian, women. Any one of them could have been a model. They had legs that were up to my ear. The embodiment of statuesque. Greek goddesses, every one. On the other side was the South Korean team. It seemed the Korean women were the polar opposites of the Soviets. Snarly, short, squat, and fiercely determined. They could have bit me in thigh without bending over. I fell in love again (Forgive the hyperbole, but everything seems magnified by the kaleidoscope of time and memory.) This match would seem to have all the signs of an imminent slaughter. It wasn't. For every towering spike smashed by the Soviet team there was a headlong dive by one of the Koreans, who defiantly, and deftly, dug out the ball and saved it from the floor. It looked like David might actually have a chance against Goliath. The Koreans were everywhere! They had ten hands each! They dove! They sacrificed! They would NOT let the ball hit the floor! The Soviet Amazons redoubled their efforts, jumping higher, smashing harder and harder, trying desperately to break the resolve of the Korean team. The contest was brutal but the Soviet Union team won. Someone had to win. But, there were no losers here.
The whole contest reminds me of Darwin. What? Where did that come from? Charles Darwin in his youth took a long voyage of discovery on the HMS Beagle. His experiences on this trip, particularly when visiting the Galapagos Islands, formed the basis for his development of the theory of evolution by natural selection. What does this have to do with women's volleyball? Everything. Darwin took several samples of what came to be known as Darwin's Finches. The Galapagos Islands are composed of several islands and atolls. Darwin collected many specimens on this voyage, including 14 different species of finches, 12 of which proved to be new to science. When Darwin returned to England, with the help of the ornithologist John Gould, who was sort of the John Audubon of Europe, it was noted that there were obvious differences in beak shape from island to island corresponding with what food the different species ate. Below is a chart illustrating this.

Note that all of the different species are believed to evolve from one ancestral form. This is a fine example of evolutionary adaptive radiation. Researchers continue to study these fascinating birds. A book entitled The Beak of the Finch by Jonathan Weiner, published 20 years ago documents continuing changes in Darwin's Finches, by an evolutionary process called punctuated equilibrium, which was championed by Stephen Jay Gould. Basically, punctuated equilibrium demonstrates that evolution can progress in rapid bursts over short periods of time, rather than the more gradual incremental process that Darwin envisioned.
What does this have to do with women's volleyball? Everything. Although, it would be incorrect to say that the South Korean and Soviet women are different species, it does demonstrate how variant forms can lead to success (although it's a bit of a stretch to compare volleyball success with reproductive success.). So, when did this contest of volleyball stars happen? Well, after a little searching, I discovered that it took place in 1976, and actually, The South Korean ended with a bronze medal and the Soviet team earned a silver medal, losing to the Japanese team who took the gold. That escaped my memory.
So, in summary, I have found a new way to enjoy sports, I'll just try to think about it as a metaphor for evolution. Well, that and the fact that the women were absolutely stunning. Hmm, maybe this could lead to reproductive success--and maybe I'm not such an abnormal guy after all.

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Breaking Bad Puns

07/09/2014

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TV Pilot for the Hallmark Channel: A drug lord swears off his criminal past to volunteer to teach inner-city disadvantaged kids how to read. The name of the the show? "Breaking Good." (Sorry, had to type it.)

TV pilot for the Cooking Channel: Mild-mannered high school teacher quits his job to "cook" highly-addictive GMO-laden, gluten-containing bread. Second season preview: Dave's Killer Bread muscles in on his territory, leading to an ever-increasing spiral of violence The problem is GMO foods and gluten are found to be harmless. Nobody dies. Canceled after first season due to the absence of drama. The name of the show? "Baking Bad." (You may unfriend me now.)

TV pilot for Animal Planet: A disgruntled dog leaves obedience school and teams up with an unlikely partner, a streetwise punk known as Hepcat to extract and sell 99% pure catnip crystal, noted for its slightly green tinge. The cat population becomes so addicted they entirely stop making videos, thus threatening to bring the Internet to a screeching halt. A pack of rival dogs moves in on the action. Hepcat, hopelessly addicted to crystal catnip, is no help in repelling the turf invasion, forcing Head Dog to take matters into his own paws. After several fruitless days of marking territory Head Dog contracts rabies followed by a maniacal slaughter of the invading pack. Alas, Head Dog, foaming at the mouth, expires due to a combination of inflicted wounds and disease. Hepcat disappears into the night, nowhere to be found. The name of the show: "Barking Bad." (Are you still there?)

TV pilot for Arts and Entertainment: Mild-mannered high school chemistry teacher quits to become a rogue poet and playwright, feeding the masses what they really crave: addictive quality entertainment. Alas and alack, much to his surprise, his sonnets and plays (all in diabolically tempting iamabic pentameter) prove to be irresistible to intellectuals everywhere, threatening to crater the entirety of academia. The rogue, shadowy, figure, known by the street pseudonym Heisenspeare, now in full control of the public mind, segues into the truly addictive and banal reprogramming: Pawn Stars. Duck Dynasty, Bigfoot Hunters, The Long Island Medium, The Dr Oz Show. Millions are transfixed, and drift into brainwashed catatonia. PBS attempts to mount a counteroffensive, but lacking in funds, all they can do to repel the attack is broadcast thinly-disguised infomercials, Yanni concerts, and "Lords of the Dance" reruns. Several Downton Abbey actors resign in protest and have to be "eliminated." Heisenspeare, now a media kingpin, feeling the walls closing in, screams "My kingdom for a horse!" and "To be, or not to be!" It ends with Heisenspeare, killing himself with a self-inflicted knife wound. His last words: "Remember my name." The name of the show? "Breaking Bard" (You really want to remove this blog from your bookmark list now, don't you?)

I have at least ten more of these. Hang on a second, there are a couple of guys ringing my doorbell. They're wearing white coats. I wonder what they want. I'll be back in a minute.

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Close Encounters of the Skeptical Kind: The Nigerian Houseguest

07/02/2014

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Recently I told a true story about a housemate of mine from Nigeria who was visiting Seattle for a couple months. The story was told a coffee shop open mic called Fresh Ground Stories. Here is a link to the 8 minute audio on Soundcloud. Here is an article with more about Fresh Ground Stories, and other story-telling opportunities in Seattle. FGS is hosted by the incomparable Paul Currington.

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Podcast of "A Skeptic Looks at ELEPHANTS!" AKA Pontification from a "Shill For the Criminal Elite"

06/29/2014

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Hi-Ho skeptoids! The recording of a lecture that I gave I gave a couple weeks ago to a Seattle Skeptics Dinner is available. The major topic was elephants, and a blogged about this a few days ago, and included links to some of the sources and videos which were shown at the dinner.
But before the main presentation, I discussed a few other topics related to skepticism. Let me say first that, particularly in the beginning this talk, was really more of a conversation than a lecture. Here is a link to the recording, if you want to check it out.
So, while you're listening to the recording, I thought I'd clarify a couple of my statements and offer a couple of corrections.
at 1:50
Here is the link for "Friday night at the Meaningful Movies," in Seattle.
at 2:15
The film was called "How to Make Money Selling Drugs." Here is the trailer:

at 2:20
Here is a link for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.
at 6:00
Take 'im off the shelf, should have been "Talk 'im off the ledge."
Below is a link to part 1 a video of the "Best of Sam Harris," I admire the clarity and calm demeanor with which he delivers his arguments.

at 6:26
The Unpersuadables (The full title is The Unpersuadables: Adventures with the Enemies of Science) by Will Storr can be purchased from from Amazon at this link.

at 9:37
Boy, I really garbled this one. What I was trying to say is that in an unbiased test that you will get false positives or false negatives, simply because of statistical probability. An example is that if you flip a coin five times in a row, there is a statistical possibility that you will get five heads in a row. Actually, the exact probability, in a fair coin, of getting "heads" is 1 in 2X2X2X2X2 trials--or only once in 32 groups of 5 coin tosses--a pretty unlikely event. The way to obviate this is to increase the sample size. For example, if you toss a fair coin 6 times in a row the probability shrinks to once in 64 tosses. So, applying this to the highly-selected homeopathic studies, the higher the sample size, the less significant the data were. My statement that "for a percentage of the time you would expect your data to not support your hypothesis" was erroneous, very sloppy, logic. What I was trying to say is that "for a percentage of the time, you would expect your data to not support the UNDERLYING REALITY--just like the coin tosses. Sorry about that. I'll try and be more accurate next time. BTW, here is a link to the definition of type I and type II statistical errors if you want to learn more.
At 10:30
Here is the text of the quote from Will Storr's book:

Stories work against truth. They operate with the machinery of prejudice and distortion. Their purpose is not fact but propaganda. The scientific method is the tool that humans have developed to break the dominion of the narrative. It has been designed specifically to dissolve anecdote, to strip out emotion and leave only unpolluted data. It is a new kind of language, a modern sorcery, and it has gifted our species incredible powers. We can eradicate plagues, extend our lives by decades, build rockets and fly through space. But we can hardly be surprised if some feel an instinctive hostility towards it, for it is fundamentally inhuman.

At 16:20
Here is the short "preview" of an epigenetics lecture that I might give in the future:

At 21:50
The discussion was a little hard to hear, but what it was about was a comparison between Lamarckism and epigenetic change. If you're interested, here is a link that explains the differences.
At 23:58
The discussion was about the limits of scientific "proof." Actually, science doesn't really "prove" anything, it just leads to increasing liklihood of identifying truth. Here is a good video from Qualia that explains this concept clearly.

At 25:21
Here is a link to Phil Plait's arguments against the idea that the Apollo Program was a hoax.
At 25:35
This is where the actual talk about elephants began. For links related to this I refer you to my previous blog post. And, as I made clear in the audio, I don't know a dang thing about elephants. I am in no way am I an expert. So, feel free to disagree with everything I say.
In fact, feel free to disagree with anything I say EVER! What do I know? Do ya think?

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A Skeptic Looks at Elephants

06/25/2014

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    Tuesday of last week I gave a talk to the Seattle Skeptics Meetup dinner (Sorry, the link only works for Meetup members) called "A Skeptic Looks at ELEPHANTS." This is a follow-up blog post containing some of the info and links from the talk.
    A couple months ago I blogged about the possibility of crows showing behavior resembling a funeral ritual. I discussed this with caveats about the dangers of analyzing of animals by applying human standards, known as anthropomorphism. But what of elephants? Do elephants have funerals? Do they have feelings? How intelligent or altruistic are they? Are there elephant artists? Should they be afforded the same ethic standards that we apply to humans? Or, is this all just anthropomorphising?
    First, let me say that I think elephants are one of the coolest critters in the world. It is hard to imagine that Mastodons wandered around in North America up until about 10,000 years ago and wooly mammoths did not become extinct until about 4,000 years ago. Contrast that with dinosaurs, which disappeared about 60 million years ago. In fact, human hunting is thought to be a major contributor to the demise of both species. Too bad. I think it would be neat to have elephant-like animals in my back yard (Well, maybe not.).
    But we still have elephants, the largest land animals in the world. I highlight elephants, because, it seems to me, to be one of the harder examples of animals to be dismissive of what appears to be human-like behavior. Here's an excellent article from Scientific American Magazine about elephants that I recommend.
    An interesting aside, when I was researching this topic, I learned of a new word (DYT Blog readers know how much I love words)--the opposite of anthropomorphism-- "theriomorphism," i.e. to ascribe animal characteristics to humans (Quit acting like an ape, ya knucklehead. She eats like a bird!).
    So, what of elephants? In what ways do they resemble humans?
    For one thing, they're very intelligent. Proportionate to body size, elephant brains are very large, and seem to be organized similar to humans. (Note: This proportion is a pretty crude, and sometimes misleading, indication of intelligence. More info here.) In terms of intelligence, elephants seem to be comparable to cetaceans (whales and dolphins), corvids (crows, ravens, magpies and jays), and non-human primates. Elephants have a strong sense of community, in a matriarchal system. They also have high levels of what appears to be emotional intelligence, with strong senses of empathy and altruism, possibly even across species. Here's a Wikipedia link on elephant cognition, which lists a wide variety of abilities, "...including those associated with grief, learning, allomothering, mimicry, play, altruism, use of tools, compassion, cooperation, self-awareness, memory, and language." Wow! Quite a list. I really had no idea, when I started researching this topic, that elephants had that many skills.
    Check out the video below, where, Kandula, an elephant at the National Zoo figured out how to use a cube to reach food that was suspended just out of reach overhead. This shows pretty good evidence of creative problem-solving and tool using skills, but elephants have a lot more indications of higher
cognition.

Here's an interesting experiment. A device was constructed that allowed elephants to receive a reward if two elephants operated a pulley device. (Watch the video below to see how exactly it was designed.)This measured not only problem-solving skills, but their ability to cooperate.

Something I didn't know before looking into this topic is that elephants can be parrots; i.e. they can be mimics, that, with a little help from their trunks, emulate human speech. Check out the video below.

Here's a link to another interesting video of a scientist studying elephant communication through ground vibrations.
Below are some videos showing examples of supposed elephant "art" that set my skeptic-sense tingling. Have you ever heard of elephant painting? How about an elephant orchestra? Below are three videos of so-called elephant "art." And, not to be outdone, one example of dolphin "art."

So, what do I make of all this? I really can't see a lot of evidence of creativity, which is the hallmark of art. What I do see are well-trained elephants. I was going to do a lot more digging on this topic, but Snopes has already done most of the grunt work for me. I will say though that I'm mightily impressed by the dexterity of their trunks! I think this is pretty much a harmless way to mine for tourist souvenir dollars, but I'm dubious that this indicates real creative, i.e. artistic, expression.
In contrast, I'm a little less doubtful of the possibility of elephant funerals. Apparently, elephants have been known to remain near a dead companion for a long time after they expired. Here is an account from the Wikipedia article cited above.

Elephant researcher Martin Meredith recalls an occurrence in his book about a typical elephant death ritual that was witnessed by Anthony Hall-Martin, a South African biologist who had studied elephants in Addo, South Africa, for over eight years. The entire family of a dead matriarch, including her young calf, were all gently touching her body with their trunks, trying to lift her. The elephant herd were all rumbling loudly. The calf was observed to be weeping and made sounds that sounded like a scream, but then the entire herd fell incredibly silent. They then began to throw leaves and dirt over the body and broke off tree branches to cover her. They spent the next two days quietly standing over her body. They sometimes had to leave to get water or food, but they would always return.

Apparently, reports like these are not at all uncommon. Check out the video below. Although the camera-placement, and enhanced spooky music suggest it is a bit staged, I think it conveys the idea that elephants are pretty curious about this dead body of their own kind.

Are elephants afraid of mice? Below is a video that kind of surprised me. The guys of Mythbuster's fame tested this and found this possibility "plausible." Check it out. What do you think?

    My take is that, this can be criticized on several different levels: 1) a test with a brown mouse might have been preferable, 2) The test may have been repeatable, but it looks like they only tested one or two elephants, and 3) It's not at all obvious that the elephants didn't shy away simply because they were startled by by rapid movements not at all specific to mice (elephants have poor eyesight.) But hey, they did do a control with they empty dung ball, and they did repeat the experiment, and they illustrated the idea that when you do an experiment, you don't always get the expected outcome. I also give them credit for stating that the legend of mouse-fearing elephants is "plausible" rather than "definitive." I find their result intriguing.
    I concluded my talk with a discussion of the ethics of keeping elephants in zoos and circuses. This is a tough call for me. I encourage the reader to give some thought about the ethics of keeping such large, intelligent, animals in a zoo enclosure, or transported from city to city to perform in circuses. Here's an article that lists the pros and cons of Zoos. Zoos have done a lot of work to try and preserve species through captive breeding programs. There are more tigers in captivity now than in the wild. In addition many zoos have worked to create a more humane environment for the animals, providing more space and trying to preserve family structures--very hard to do with elephants, given their complex family structure and large size. Zoos educate the public, particularly important in cities where nature is scarce. I think the experience of seeing and elephant or a polar bear in a zoo can go a long way toward creating an appreciation and public awareness for natural history, and may encourage the preservation of ecosystems and even mitigation of the global climate change crisis. In other words, one might invoke a "greater good argument." reminiscent of arguments justifying the use of animals in medical research for the greater good of benefiting human beings, in developing an understanding of, or even cures, for disease. Similarly, it may be defensible to keep charismatic zoo and circus animals for the benefits accrued in public entertainment and education. But, to re-state my position, this is a tough call for me, and I would hope that zoos would provide as ideal and humane an environment for the animals as possible.
    A few years ago this was a prominent local issue in the Seattle area when a baby elephant died in the local Woodland Park Zoo. I invite you to check out the local news coverage if you want details.
    So, that is the basic outline of my talk. I really feel like it would take a lot more than a one hour talk to do this subject justice. I haven't read this book,
"The Elephant's Secret Sense: The Hidden Life of the Wild Herds of Africa," by Caitlin O'Connell, but it seems quite highly regarded by reviewers at Amazon, if you want more info. Maybe I'll read that next.

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Choprawoo Evolves Into Choprastupid

06/16/2014

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Deepak is at it again. A few weeks ago I blogged about a fave word coined by Orac, "Choprawoo." Well, a couple days ago I came across a challenge to James Randi's Million Dollar challenge issued by Deepak Chopra that is so obviously stupid that I can hardly believe it. I was going to blog about it at length, but before I got a chance, Jerry Coyne beat me to it. In fact, Jerry did such a nice job that I'm not going to even try to top his eloquence. Just go and read it yourself. Thanks, Dr. Coyne, for saving me the trouble. I'll say this much, Deepak is right in the video below, I thought the writing on his shirt translated as "Kick me, I'm a moron." I guess I was wrong.

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Frogs are Coming to PBS!

06/11/2014

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Just a heads up for my fellow frog fans. Nature is airing a documentary on frogs on June 25th. YAY! Here is a description from the website.

Sir David Attenborough takes us on a journey through the weird and wonderful world of frogs, shedding new light on these charismatic, colorful and frequently bizarre little animals through first-hand stories, the latest science, and cutting-edge technology. Frogs from around the world are used to demonstrate the wide variety of frog anatomy, appearance and behavior. Their amazing adaptations and survival techniques have made them the most successful of all amphibians.

Don't miss it!

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How Do You Face the Prospect of Oblivion? Ask a Rat.

05/12/2014

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I'm delighted with the performance of my short comedic play "Waiting For Boa" in the Writer's and Actors Reading and Performing (WARP) showcase of plays "WARP Springs a Gnu." which just completed half it's run at the Seattle Center Theater 4. My play which was directed by John Paul Sharp and Jason Dooley, and stars Brendan Mack and Julian Garcia as the rats Elmo and Ben, Joshua Moore as the snake and Beatrix Turner-Rodriguez as the hand and voice.
This was based on a true story. Several years ago I visited my cousin and her young son owned a caged boa constrictor. Next to the cage was another cage containing Snakie's prospective dinner--a couple of caged rats. What were the rats thinking? What was Snakie thinking? There are two performances left. If you live anywhere near Seattle, you might want to check out one of the two remaining performances on Saturday May 17th at 8Pm or the final show Sunday May 18th, a matinee at 2PM. Here is a link to more ticketing info.
Below are some pics taken by Carl Nelson of the first performances.

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Happy Mother's Day: A Song Supporting Why De-Extinction is Misguided

05/11/2014

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About a year ago I blogged about De-extinction, a process to try and resuscitate several extinct animals, by replacing the DNA in oocytes of existing, but closely related species with archival DNA from extinct critters. You can read the blog entry at this link. Basically my misgivings were the following:

"1)I don't believe that any of these creatures should be released into the wild. Repopulating North America with semi-pseudo wooly mammoths or frankenfrogs? Bad idea. 2)I really wonder what conclusions can be drawn from the possible results of these experiments? Can we ever draw definitive conclusions about the behavior and biology of these "resurrected genomes?" Even the Dolly experiments, using donor eggs from the same species, resulted in adult animals with serious health problems and I expect that using donor eggs from differing species will result in even greater deviations from normal adults.

My thinking really hasn't changed a whole lot, but now, in celebration of Mother's Day, I highlight the following video, which spells out disproportionate contribution that our moms make to our genetic makeup, which provides more ammunition to my argument that these frankencritters are likely, at best, to be little more than curiosities about which conclusions will always be suspect. Agree, or disagree, one thing we can all agree on is that moms are awesome. Happy Mothers Day!

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Does a Murder of Crows Have a Funeral?

04/19/2014

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There's been a bit of a flutter through the internet recently about the possibility of crow "funerals." Hm, funerals, huh? But what, exactly, is meant by "funeral." It has been observed, and is not disputed, that members of the corvid family, which includes crows, jays, magpies and ravens, seem to gather around a dead bird of their own species and vocalize. Several explanations for this behavior are possible: 1) to warn other birds of possible danger, 2) bringing attention to fellow birds of a change in hierarchy, 3) exploring the possible causes of death, or, possibly, 4) an individual or group expression of grief. It is very easy to compare these behaviors to human equivalents, such as grieving, but, then again, it is also difficult to definitively rule out such comparisons. Since humans evolved as certainly as other animals, why is it unreasonable to suppose that some critters haven't evolved the same emotions? The fancy term used to ascribe human form or characteristics on anything besides humans, such as gods or animals, is anthropomorphism. Actually, I'm rather fond of this myself, as evidenced by the number talking animals in my plays. It's no mystery why fundamentalist religious folks often portray God as a bearded father-figure. On the topic of crow funerals, I invite you to check out this funding drive initiated by a University of Washington lab to explore what areas of the brain are stimulated during this funeral-like ritual. This might lead to clues about what the birds are actually thinking. If you are interested, you might also want to check out other possibly worthy scientific projects seeking funding, using a model similar to kick starter, at this link.
    There might, in fact, be a number of emotions that humans share with other animals. This article from Yes Magazine, seems very sympathetic to this idea "Many animals also display wide-ranging emotions, including joy, happiness, empathy, compassion, grief, and even resentment and embarrassment." But, there is still the danger of over-interpretation. For example, there is evidence showing that the evident "guilt" shown by dogs for their misbehavior might simply be a response to scolding.
    A similar problem to anthropomorphizing emotions is to try to superimpose human standards of intelligence on animals. This article examines the challenges of studying crow intelligence. Are humans less intelligent than birds because we might be challenged to build a nest? It has been shown that some dogs can be trained to identify traces of cancer in human urine. I can't track down the quote (I think it was E.O. Wilson), but to paraphrase, "When it comes to the sense of smell, compared to dogs human beings are idiots."
    Another anthropomorphic "trap" is to try to apply human morals to animals. Here is a list of 11 animals that, like many humans, tend toward monogamy. But, I think, it is important to note that monogamy or polygamy are probably just different survival strategies, not extensions of morality.
    Given the complications of evaluating animals on the basis of emotions, intelligence, or morality, how does one prudently examine animal behavior? I think the best approach is to fall on fundamental evolutionary principles and objective laboratory instrumentation. Do these, often ritualized, animal habits or learned behaviors confer some reproductive or survival benefit? How can this be understood? How could this be measured? What I like about the UW crow project is that it utilizes scans (I believe they are Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scans.) to try to identify which areas are activated, although I have some qualms about whether a laboratory study is truly representative about what might happen in the field.
    A few years ago I was surprised to observe a leucistic crow in my neighborhood of West Seattle. Leucism, which is a rare mutation in a variety of different animals, results in "paleness," that is, diminished pigment, in contrast to albinism, another mutation resulting in the complete absence of pigment, i.e. white animals with pink eyes. The local leucistic crow, dubbed "Leucy" by the local media, died in a heatwave a few years ago.
    I have some personal history regarding a bird behavior study from my undergraduate years. At Southern Illinois University there was a fairly eccentric professor who developed this hypothesis that owls engage in what he described as "prey-thawing." His belief was that owls use their body heat to thaw out frozen road kill, and thus were distracted by this task enough to often become road kill themselves. The Professor proposed this to me as a potential grad school thesis project. Unlike the UW project, he seemed uninterested in trying this in a laboratory setting. My response: "Lessee, you want me to kill a rabbit, freeze it, and put it on the side of the road, wait for an owl to happen by, who 'might' sit on the dead rabbit, and then I should wait for a passing truck, who 'might' kill the owl, and you want me to do a statistical evaluation of this phenom? His response: "Yep." My response: "Well, Professor, if I find anyone interested in this kind of project, I'll be sure to send them your way." As soon as I left his office I couldn't contain my laughter. I could just imagine myself, sitting in my car at the side of the road in freezing cold...staring at a dead bunny for hours at end ...waiting ...waiting...waiting--I don't think so. Maybe in my next blog entry I'll consider why owls are considered wise, or why swans are considered symbols of enduring love. But for now, let me leave you with the promotional video from the UW project and a couple of vids reputing to show magpie and raven funerals.