daneeka

Hah, nice. But while, on a phylogenetic basis, a sea horse is closer to a horse than a sea star is to a fish, such relatedness is irrelevant in assigning commmon names to present taxa because common names are rarely based on phylogenies. The point is that calling a starfish a starfish is not erroneous, and anyone suggesting a common name change based on systematics is just being unessarily pedantic, because anyone interested in a species' taxonomy would use the binomial anyway.

... but a startfish is probably closer to a fish than a seahorse is to a horse.

Metabolic rate could also influence speciation rates because it can have have a major effect on rates of molecular evolution - metabolism generates by-products that can oxidise DNA (like free radicals) and consequently cause mutations. So a higher metabolic rate results in increased DNA oxidation and therefore greater rates if molecular evolution; and, because molecular evolution is needed for speciation in both sympatric and allopatric populations, increased rates would therefore result in a greater potential for speciation. Further, generation time is also influenced by metablic rate (isn't it?) - a small rodent, with an extremly high metabolic rate, maintains a much faster generatioin time than large bodied mammals - and this too could have an effect on speciation because shorter generation time means a greater number of germ cell devision, and consequently greater chance of replication errors per unit time. The consequences of this, to drag this back on topic, is that in highly productive areas (like low latitudes) you get greater metobolic rates which increases speciation rates which in tern increases species richness. A general concept in biology is that species richness increases along a latitudinal gradient, from high to low lattitudes.

Unless you specify a certain moss type all you can really to is generalise. Obviously those organisms that maintain a symbiotic link to the moss would suffer; and this would probably mean that a variety of other organisms, dependant on the moss symbiotes, would also decline. So there would probably be heaps of potential, somewhat indirect, flow-on effects caused by changes in the food-web (e.g. their might be a change in the abundance of various insectivorous species as a result in changes in the abundance of various moss dependant insects). The floristic composition of the forest community may also change: moss, as SkepticLance pointed out, creates a regeneration niche that no doubt would allow certain plant species to to better compete against other species that occupy a similar niche. So the loss of this regeneration niche would reduce or even exclude the recruitment of various plants - which would also maintain a number of flow-on effects.

Cheers for the paper Dr. Dalek Yeah I'm probably going to focus on direct symbioses. The most obvious ones that spring to mind are seed dispersal and pollination...and now myrmecophyte-ant relationships.

Hello all, I'm preparing a lit review on plant-animal interdependance and I was just wondering if anyone knows of any key papers on the subject; or if you yourselves could impart any key examples. I'm excluding direct trophic links (like dietry dependencies) from the review in order to narrow things down a bit.

Non-scientific modes of thought have obviously achieved bugger all regarding technological progress. However, I think science has achieved very little with regard to societal progress; and I don't think it ever will. Further, to consider non-scientific modes of thought as useless is a little harsh don't you think? There's a lot to be said for the benefits of non-scientific reckoning (spritualism; self-reflection; meditation; theology; the Arts etc.). What's the rush anyway? I'm sure the planet will be here for quite a while; and it looks pretty cool when you're not constantly attempting to view it though the esoteric eyes of science...

Yes but a mechanic doesn't fix your car without explaining the problem. Perhaps I was a bit vague in starting this thread. I'm not suggesting that people need to understand the grounds behind research (e.g. how the car works). I'm just saying that maybe a little more attention needs to be paid to ensure people understand what the problem is, so that an informed decision can be made. I would have thought the burden quite apparent: misinformation, bias representation of information and inaccessible information essentially equates to a poorly informed society. So who influences governmental decision making (assuming a democracy that is)? It's not the scientific community that's for sure.

I consider effective communication to be a fundamental component of good science. However, I can't help but feel that the communication of science is becoming almost elitist in nature: it seems we spend much of our time communicating such that only a small percentage of people actually understand what is actually being stated. Scholarly reporting is obviously important but is too much emphasis placed on such authoring?

But there is evidence to show that they are harmful to people isn't there? I don't really know all too much on the subject but I'm aware that various organic compounds are considered to be a human health issue. So if they are harmful to people, does it not make sense they could also be of harm to other mammals?

Is bioaccumulation not a problem though? Soluble pollutants don't appear to be a long term problem but a lot of the compounds we produce tend to hang around for a pretty long time; and many of these substances aren't event injected into the ocean. Sterility among certain whale taxa, for example, is thought be caused by such an effect.

I think their presentation is fine. What's more, science is political - governments commonly use science as a political tool - so I hardly think scientists engaging in politics is a bad thing. I mean, politicians often engage in science... But this is getting off topic isn't it...so I'm just going to say this: science will not advance without debate - we need people to ask questions (isn't that what science is all about?) - but argument is not debate and tends to lead to entirely different outcomes.

Here is something I think you guys should have a read of. It's a bit off topic (and a tad opinionated) but I think it quite nicely highlights the problems that occur when we attempt mix science with politics.

Yeah I believe we are young as a species and, what's more, global trade and communication is in its infancy; and there exists an awful lot of room for improvement. We are all guilty of being ignorant to some degree however I think a greater problem is that many trade their ignorance for arrogance. Those within the scientific community, who consistently fail to communicate in a language in which the majority of people find understandable, are particularly guilty of this; and I think this is quite a problem if we wish to achieve an informed society - the news, internet and other forms of mass media tend to misinform more than anything.

Perhaps a nice question could be: "What percentage of your high school education do you think you can remember?" Hmmm that might make a good thread...

Yeah the whole SETI thing is a little fuzzy; has anyone actually looked at the Drake Equation? It's kinda sad really..looks like some sort of relic from 60's pseudoscience. Aliens are cool though so best of luck to them.

Mmm seems the US has some pretty weird solutions for even stranger problems. Why don't they just ban kids from going to school? That'd surely result in a huge decrease in confiscations.

Yeah I agree that biofeuls aren't much of a solution to the whole energy problem. I mean most intensive agriculture is not sustainable so it seems kind of daft to replace one unsustainable activity with another. It's all to do with consumption habbits though. We have essentially been conditioned into thinking that consuming excessively is entirely appropriate; and we keep trying to dream up ways that will allow us to continue living the life-styles we are used to. You'd think, with all the insight we've developed over the years regarding all the problems created by gross-comsumption, that we would make a conscious effort to change.

I'm just interested to hear people's ideas on the primary cause on global biotic diversity patterns. There is an obvious lattitudinal relationship with increased rates of species diversity with a decrease in lattitude (i.e. the tropics harbour greater diversity than more temperate regions). Any thoughts?

Yep, no doubt about it, people are the cause of global warming. But only in a hypothetical sense. If anyone actually looked into the science of climate models you'd see that they don't actually tell you much; global warming is something that has been accepted by concensus not by sceince. I think that climate models and their erroneous nature is perhaps the most compeling criticism of global warming. I mean, the fact that all it takes is a pretty graph to convince people of our impending doom seems a little silly, particularly if the model used to produce the graph is based on nothing more than asumption - I mean very few of the variables within the equations used to produce future climate models can be determined.

4) Education - An informed society will tend to be more accepting of new ideas. 5) Community Participation - One of the best forms of education is experiential education - learning by doing - so initiating things like community recycling projects, ecological restoration projects etc. are good for raising awareness. But getting people to participate is another thing alltoghether.

A superspecies essentially involves the grouping of closly related allopatric populations (I'm not sure why it is not considered for sympatric populations - perhaps because some people refute that speciation cannot occur within sympatry); so yeah, a rank above species. I think that for some lifeforms this may be appropriate and may, to a large extent, rule out the problem of species synonymy within taxonomy..especially with bacteria and their ilk.

Very few organisms present today were around a billion years ago; 5 mass extintion events and and consistant stochastic changes have seen to that. What's your point? What is this powerful evidence? Unless you can test speciation through natural selection, and apply it to all life, then all 'powerfull evidence' is circumstantial at best. Yes I know speciation occurs; and that it can sort of be tested with certain taxa. However I'm not sure all speciation occurs through natural selection. This is not to say that life appeared through some sort of intelligent design ala Creationism. Furthermore, I hardly think that "not being able to prove it wrong" is grounds for accepting the theory as fact.

Man all these arguments are so circular: evolution is not possible because there is inadequate proof; no no Creationism is not possible because there is inadequate proof... wow how enlightening. Here's my perspective: evolution by natural selection is not the only way speciation occurs; to the best of my knowledge things don't just appear out of thin air..but I can't think of a way to prove unequivicably that they don't; we have been studying life empirically for far too short a time to accept any theory as absolute; and, finally, the Church has very little to do with intelligent creation - if creationism is fact than it is likely to occur for reasons other than those presented such an acquisitive institution. I like evolution as a theory - it makes a lot of sense - however I'm not willing to deny Creationism simply because I don't really know much about it. Are there any creationsist out there willing to say the same about evolution?