4/4/2003: Colossal squid

[xoxoxoBruce]

The squid now resides in a glass tank, filled to the brim with preservative solution, and is one of 22 million specimens that can be seen as part of the behind-the-scenes Darwin Centre tour of the Natural History Museum.

Seems they make you buy the E-ticket to see this sucker(s).

[Electrophile]

Here's another strange sea-creature that just popped up. My wife thinks it looks like it's wearing chaps.


Also, a quick comment about Juju's old, old post regarding fossil hunters faking data.

The professor was wrong in stating that no one would ever do that; I can think of three cases within the last two months of biologists faking data (one a cloning researcher who submitted fake pictures, one a psychologist(?) who invented a fake population of people and fake answers to questions, and one who lied about some RNAi experiments). The good news is that they were all caught. The proof of science is that other scientists go back and repeat (or in these cases, do not repeat) the experiments. The VAST majority of scientists are honest about their results and have come up with a good system for verifying the work of others to the point of sharing their DNA and cell lines with competitors. Fossil dating is a good example of this. Say you have one fossil which can not be dated except by the soil above and below it. Eventually someone will find another fossil of the same type which can be dated. If the new date is different from the old date, they'll wait until a few more can be dated and a firm conclusion can be reached. Eventually, if corrections are required, they'll be adopted.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Pssst...Electrophile.....over here.
I would expect scientists faking it to be caught. Too much peer review to slip anything important through.

[lulu]

That's enough calamari to feed an entire Greek wedding reception.