On Faith and the 'Flying Squirrel'

Faith is a strong emotion. It's not purely human though, in fact I can think of many cases of animals putting their faith into themselves or others. Lemmings for example have to have faith that their migratory path isn't going to not run off of a cliff or into a predator, they do sometimes though. Lemmings are awesome, but faith isn't something that always does them good. Lemmings are misunderstood creatures. Most misconceptions of lemmings are that they commit mass suicide. This is nonsense, actually an Academy award winning Disney documentary once fired Canadian lemmings off a cliff using a turntable and used it as proof. Poor lemmings, all they want to do is reproduce. Their reproduction is actually so rapid that they're population fluctuations are chaotic and unlike any linear population cycles belonging to any other vertebrates. They then plummet to near extinction after about 4 years due to not having enough food to sustain the rapid lemming growth, then it goes back up when they reproduce crazily again. Off topic slightly there, the point is people often think of faith as being a good emotion, I don't particularly like it.

To have faith in something, you have complete trust or confidence in someone or something, or a strong belief in religious doctrines based on nothing other than spiritual conviction. The thing is, faith in a human sense is usually the emotion used to describe a belief that isn't backed up by any evidence. For example, I don't have faith that evolution is happening or has previously happened, I know that evolution is happening because it's a fact, it happens... get over it. 

Animals don't have the same kind of faith as humans do. Animals faith is based on evidence. If a flying squirrel has faith that it can jump from one tree and perfectly land on the next, it's not doing it because it was brought up to think that way or that somebody told him to do it 2000 years ago, he has faith he can do it because he has done it countless times and he knows it is in within the realms of possibilities. In that sense, human faith is in fact the most primitive.

Now you might argue, what about that very first Flying squirrel. That unhinged genius. That f*cking pioneer of squirrel flight. Well, that very first squirrel wasn't a prophet, it wasn't the messiah of squirrels or the son of the squirrel God, it was just a normal squirrel, that by chance happened to jump from one tree to another tree that was slightly further away than a standard squirrel leap could take him. He managed to get to that other tree due to a genetic mutation which gave him a slight anatomical advantage. Due to this anatomical advantage this squirrel managed to get to that next tree and hence was able to get to prey quicker and away from predators faster, this allows the mutant squirrel to pass on his genes through reproduction and all the other squirrels with this mutation could mate more successfully and survive for longer. 

Over a number of generations the flying squirrel we know today was eventually here. A squirrel with a paragium membrane linked to its wrist and ankles with acts like a little fury parachute so it could glide from tree to tree. It can maneuver using movements of a small cartilaginous wrist bone which can control the tautness of this membrane and has a fluffy tail which stabilises in flight and acts as an adjunct airfoil to slow the squirrel when it reaches its destination, usually a tree trunk. What's next in terms of squirrel evolution? I have no idea and will never find out. Evolution takes a while, most people don't really understand that.

"Yippie kay yay motherfucker!"

Off course, humans evolved as well. Maybe not evolved in the conventional sense (though obviously we did at one point in Africa from Homo Erectus...get over it) but in the sense that our society has evolved and with that our knowledge and understanding has evolved. You might now be able to see why it's this subject I've chosen to pursue as a career. I love it.

You guys might not really care about flying squirrels or lemmings on Halloween, you might care more about banishing evil spirits with costumes to scare the back to the underworld. Or you might just want to get hammered. I'd be content if I achieved a bit off both.

Cheers for reading, another day, another song. This one is quite lovely.

On Intelligent life and the Hidden Me

The universe is a big place. Actually to call it the universe in itself is wrong, I should say the 'observable universe', because there is probably a lot more too it then we can currently comprehend. Somewhere in this ever expanding cosmos is a galaxy called the 'Milky Way'. I've always loved that name, it is so fitting when you look at images of it, like a big milky swirl in an infinite darkness. Off all of the names we could have called our galaxy, we choose 'Milky Way', something strangely nice about it. Milk is such an average thing to us, galaxies are something we can only begin to start to understand... It's difficult to explain but I just think its quite nice. Actually in the big picture milk is probably more amazing than galaxies. Theres only one place we know of with milk, and only one way of getting it. Unless there's a giant milk planet somewhere, or another planet containing carbon based organisms that produce milk as a nutritious food source for their young. You know, I just realised that the Milky way is my background as well. Either that or another pinwheel galaxy. 

Most people I know think that there must be some other form of life somewhere else. It's one of the big questions... 'Are we alone?' The truth is I hope not. As a Star Wars fanatic, I honestly hope that in the future somewhere we are fully ingrained in a Galactic empire and we would have harnessed the force. That's wishful thinking, but I live in hope.

It's not that I'm dying to meet some alien though, I think it would be fascinating to see how life evolved in another, distant planet. As a zoologist that has to be the ultimate, but I'm more than satisfied with the abundance of life on this planet we call Earth. Some people might wonder why it is that I am so obsessed with animals. The truth is I don't know. My family isn't particularly interested in animals other than my Canadian side which enjoy hunting and killing them. I just think that life is the most amazing thing in the entire universe, and to study the things that live is a fantastic pleasure and an honour. They shouldn't be killed for sport, thats one thing that I hate. I'm never going to be a vegetarian though, animals are supposed to be eaten. We evolved to eat meat, going against that is not natural. Vegetarians are freaks, not in a horrible way though...

I hope you ate that Elk Darren.

It's very interesting to me that my Dad was the only member of his family that didn't partake in hunting of any kind. Even my Mum, who usually isn't usually one to bring up any good traits my Dad might have, admits that with this, he was unusually good. He was in the Canadian army as well, so I doubt he'd have much trouble killing a person (not that the Canadian army do much of that...) but animals he didn't go for.

I don't really know what good traits I have. Maybe someone could tell me, maybe I don't have any outstanding traits at all. If I'm completely honest I've only fully opened up to two people in the entire world, and one of them is my Uncle. See, I said I'd make the next entry more personal. I don't really open up very well. I'm the same person around everyone, but I adapt my personality to suit the person I'm talking to. Kind of like a Chameleon which changes its skin colour to suit its environment. It's not just camouflage that changes the Chameleons colour though, its hormone levels and moods as well. My moods don't affect how I talk to people, unless its the people very close to me like my Uncle.

I have a lot of things that I don't tell anyone about. I'll tell everyone one now though... I have been writing a book on and off for the last two years. I don't know why I find it hard to tell people things like that, maybe its because I don't want anyone to read it. To this day, I'm the only one that is allowed to. 

So now you know more about me. Great. This wasn't the greatest of entries to be honest but I'm tired and I just witnessed the best game of football I've ever seen.

Another blog, another song. This one in tribute to a great man who died the other day.

On Ignorance and Female Kind

Recently I've been thinking a lot about what I want to do with my life. As a student hopefully on his way to university, I suppose it's only natural to start thinking about my future. The problem is, no matter how far in advance you want to plan it all out, it rarely, if ever, happens like that. It's not quite going with the flow, more of intelligently riding the wave to get to an area kind of where you want to be. Yeah, my analogies aren't great...

If my zoological mind came to work, I'd say humans are just animals. We want what all animals want and thats to reproduce, live as long as possible and not get eaten. The last two kind of link together, I'd go as far as to say you can't have one without the other. Actually to be fair you can't reproduce if you are being eaten either (unless you were really quick), but you can reproduce and then be eaten... you can't live as long as possible and then get eaten though, unless you get eaten at the exact moment that you were going to die of an unavoidable natural cause anyway. Humans rarely get eaten anymore, but I'd still say avoiding it would be in my top three life goals. 

I highly doubt these basic animalistic necessities are included in what most people want to achieve with their lives; I'd say most peoples would be to get a good job, have kids and do as much as you can with your life. Thats good, but it's almost impossible to do everything you want to do in life in this modern day society we live in. I've been thinking that maybe humans have complicated life to much. If you watch a cat, they basically do what they like, live for free and sleep comfortably all day. You can't really top that. Cats have got life down perfectly, most animals have actually. Humans are the only animals that thought: 'You know what? This isn't enough for me, I want more.' and by wanting more, they only succeeded in getting less.

Now, my favourite people in all of history have to be the native american plains indians. Not only did they have life down perfectly, but they also had awesome names like 'Red Cloud' and 'Sitting Bull' and my personal favourite 'Drinks Water'. They moved around, hunting buffalo and having visions. They had an abundance of women to choose from, all of them more than happy to do all the work and look after the kids. There was a lot of kids. Other than the odd skirmish with another tribe, they were relatively at peace. Life was simple, but ignorance is bliss. They didn't want anymore, because to them, moving around with the buffalo is all that mattered. They didn't live very long lives but who cares? Life was awesome and they lived it to the full. The white man took that away from them and tried to replace the buffalo with Jesus. When they said no they were branded as savages and shot on sight, women, children and all. Quite macabre. Guess what society we are derived from though? When I say we I don't technically mean we, I mean Americans, but Americans are basically English but with less brains and and more highly developed trigger fingers. 

This dude knew how to live.

You know what, reading back that last paragraph I might have a new favourite word: Skirmish. It's truly a great word. Another thing that caught my eye was that if I was to say that this society would be better with the women looking after the kids and doing all the work, I'd be castrated and called a sexist, pig-headed misogynist. I don't believe they should, obviously. In indian society women were well respected. They brought you into the world after all, why shouldn't they be? Women are great, especially at my age they are pretty much the be all and end all of my waking thoughts. Okay now I sound like a creep, let's just say women are important.

Within most social animals groups, women rule the roost. Termites, Ants and Bees all have a queen, Elephants have a matriarch and Meerkats have a dominant female. Theres a few backwards ones such as Lions, where males rule and women do all the work. Lemurs are female led until one day of the year when the males go crazy and demand sex. If Human females were sexually active for only one day of the year, then I don't suppose it would matter that much. We, other than dolphins are the only animals that have recreational sex. This to me, shows why humans and dolphins are the two most intelligent species on the planet.

Despite all of this knowledge on sex and females, I'm not the luckiest guy when it comes to the other sex of my own species. Not that I get lucky with any other species, that would be wrong. Very wrong. Still, I have more female friends than male friends. I suppose thats down to my social group being female heavy.

I'd love to go on but I'm pretty sure It will get too personal if I delve any deeper. I'll save the personal stuff for another entry. One last thought, if modern society named people in the same way that the indians did (through visions coming into adulthood), I wonder what people would be called? 'Plays Xbox' or 'Parked Car' doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

Again I leave you with a song, this time by a little known band called 'Halls'. They are pretty good.

Deck the halls will boughs of Lifeblood...

On Pondering and the 'Tripod Fish'

Everyday I find myself full of wonder. Pondering is something I do quite a lot, I suppose pondering is probably my favourite word as well... except maybe smorgasboard. Maybe it's the reason I consistently lack the motivation to perform normal, everyday tasks like keeping the house clean or doing my homework. When you ponder on things such as the immensity of the universe or the beginning of life, what use is a tidy room in the grand scheme of things? I suppose, in Darwinian terms, I'm trying to make excuses for a part of myself that I don't particularly like. I don't like being 'lazy', but liking yourself is necessary for an optimum chance of reproduction, so making an excuse in your head, even if you don't really believe it, is ingrained in human nature. 

Maybe trying to ponder evolution and the size of the universe is an odd way of starting the first paragraph of your first post on your first ever blog, but honestly, it's what I usually think about. That's what blogs are for right? Maybe I've been misinformed...

Anyway, most of the people that will (hopefully) read this will know me pretty well. To quote one of the many broadway musicals that I have no interest in learning anything about, 'I am what I am'. Or, to quote Ronseal, 'It does exactly what it says on the tin', well metaphorically speaking considering I am not a tin and I don't usually have anything written on me. On second thought, maybe thats not the best quote considering I'd be referring to myself in the third person as an 'It' and Ronseal have probably register trademarked that slogan. Not that I'm going to use it in coalition with any kind of product that I'm going to be mass producing for sale to the general public... I should probably move on.

I've often been described by friends, teachers and family alike as being 'absent minded'. Unless I'm truly engrossed in a subject, I'll probably end up daydreaming... 

The mysterious and wondrous 'tripod fish'

Sorry, there I go again (hilarious I know...). That's a picture of a tripod fish if you are interested. Actually I don't care whether you are or not because I'm going to tell you about the tripod fish anyway. It's a medium sized, deep sea fish that, to conserve energy usually lost from swimming, evolved so it could move along the ocean floor on elongated pelvic and caudal (tail) fins. Pretty awesome, no? 

See, that's another good thing about writing a blog, I can say what the hell I like. Most people I talk to hate me talking about animals, and as a budding zoologist, I talk about them a fair bit. They don't tell me why but I have come to the conclusion that it's because I usually change the conversation completely away from the original topic. As you can see, I do this a lot. Variety is the spice of life though, so I will continue to interject fascinating zoologically based facts into conversations of all kinds. Sorry friends. 

I don't know how long blogs are supposed to be, but I reckon that's about all I can be bothered to write at the moment. Instinctively, people reading this will automatically zoom on the tripod fish and read the bit about that, then probably leave. That's fine though, as the tripod fish is cool enough to warrant the majority of views on any blog.

I'll love you and leave you then. A feature of this blog will be that I'm going to put a song at the end of each entry to complement the thoughtfully crafted artistic elements of the piece. As you can hopefully tell I'm being sarcastic, but I'm still going to post a song at the end and you better f*cking listen.

Sigur Ros - 'I can't spell the song name'