Tag Archives: paleontology

Neanderthals: Sensible, Decent Homebodies; and My Ancestors

A long time ago, some folks were — apparently — living happily in the Rhône River Valley. Whether or not they were happy there, we’ve found evidence that they stayed near what we call the Grotte Mandrin for 50,000 years. … Continue reading

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A Big Diamond, a Little History, and Some Geology

I take commercial puffery with a grain of salt, but that 2,492 carat diamond from the Karowe mine does seem “epic”. It’s also what I’ll be talking about this week: along with the Karowe mine, Botswana, what diamonds are and … Continue reading

Posted in Diamonds and Gems, Discursive Detours, Science News, Series | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

Evolution and a Gene Expression Code Library

Scientists have found gene groups we have in common with nearly all animals: thousands of them, from a code library that’s more than half a billion years old. I’ll be talking about that this week, plus why I see no … Continue reading

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The Cabrières Biota: an Ordovician Snapshot

When I saw “epic importance” and “fossils” in the same headline, I figured whatever’d been found would be at least somewhat out of the ordinary. I’ve learned to take journalistic puffery with at least a few grains of salt. But … Continue reading

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T. Rex, or Not T. Rex, That is the Question

Headlines about Tyrannosaurus rex, scientists, and “what we thought we knew” being wrong started showing up in my news feed last week. It’s been a while since I talked about dinosaurs, and I found Nicholas R. Longrich and Evan T. … Continue reading

Posted in Being Catholic, Discursive Detours, Science News | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments