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Do Elephants Have Knees?

Author: Charles R. Ault

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2016-08-15

Total Pages: 319

ISBN-13: 1501706411

Thinking whimsically makes serious science accessible. That’s a message that should be taken to heart by all readers who want to learn about evolution. Do Elephants Have Knees? invites readers into serious appreciation of Darwinian histories by deploying the playful thinking found in children’s books. Charles R. Ault Jr. weds children’s literature to recent research in paleontology and evolutionary biology. Inquiring into the origin of origins stories, Ault presents three portraits of Charles Darwin—curious child, twentysomething adventurer, and elderly worm scientist. Essays focusing on the origins of tetrapods, elephants, whales, and birds explain fundamental Darwinian concepts (natural selection, for example) with examples of fossil history and comparative anatomy. The imagery of the children’s story offers a way to remember and recreate scientific discoveries. By juxtaposing Darwin’s science with tales for children, Do Elephants Have Knees? underscores the importance of whimsical storytelling to the accomplishment of serious thinking. Charles Darwin mused about duck beaks and swimming bears as he imagined a pathway for the origin of baleen. A "bearduck" chimera may be a stretch, but the science linking not just cows but also whales to moose through shared ancestry has great merit. Teaching about shared ancestry may begin with attention to Bernard Wiseman’s Morris the Moose. Morris believes that cows and deer are fine examples of moose because they all have four legs and things on their heads. No whale antlers are known, but fossils of four-legged whales are. By calling attention to surprising and serendipitous echoes between children’s stories and challenging science, Ault demonstrates how playful thinking opens the doors to an understanding of evolutionary thought.

Why Elephants Have Big Ears

Author: Chris Lavers

Publisher: Macmillan

Published: 2011-04-01

Total Pages: 348

ISBN-13: 1429976691

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Why Elephants Have Big Ears is the result of one man's lifelong quest to understand why the creatures of the earth appear and act as they do. In a wry manner and personal tone, Chris Lavers explores and solves some of nature's most challenging evolutionary mysteries, such as why birds are small and plentiful, why rivers and lakes are dominated by the few remaining large reptiles, why most of the large land-dwellers are mammals, and many more.

Can Cows Walk Down Stairs?

Author: Paul Heiney

Publisher: The History Press

Published: 2011-10-24

Total Pages: 170

ISBN-13: 0752474200

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What is ear wax for? Do bacteria have sex? How do they put stripes in toothpaste? Does your nose run in space? What are stars made of? This book answers those tantalising or perplexing questions for which you thought you'd never find an answer. A book for the naturally curious, as well as those seekers after scientific truths, it unravels both those things we take for granted, such as when you boil an egg, why does the yolk stay in the middle, or why is the sky blue, as well as questions which probe deeply, such as, what does an atom look like, or what was there before the beginning of time? if you were to write in the dust on the moon, how big would the letters have to be so you could see them from earth without a telescope? Drawing on the expertise of a team of enthusiastic scientists around the world, authoritative, entertaining, and often a touch humorous, it will appeal to anyone who's ever been curious about life on earth.

Teach Them to Lift

Author: United States. Bureau of Labor Standards

Publisher:

Published: 1970

Total Pages: 40

ISBN-13:

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Beyond Science Standards

Author: Charles R. Ault

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2021-11-15

Total Pages: 343

ISBN-13: 1475859988

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Beyond Science Standards captures a vision of science education both whimsical and serious. Ranging across examples from elementary to university level classrooms and grounded in philosophy and history, the stories address dimensions beyond the realm of bureaucratic standards. Its thesis brings into question the premise of scientific unity and its representation in school as notions of method, process, nature, and practice. Schools, no less than the sciences, profit from playful exploration—of musical instruments in fourth grade physical science, for example, and hotel lobby decorative rock in a college geology course. Aesthetic expression permeates geologic interpretation and evolutionary insight—in depicting dentition, for instance, in the history of the horse family and linking this history to changing landscapes. Participating in collecting local, high altitude weather data enhances trust in climate science, especially when the observations benefit the local farming community. Allied with historical examples of the conduct of science, Beyond Science Standards offers the reader inspiring stories of science teaching, varying from place to place, time to time, discipline to discipline, and purpose to purpose.

Animals in Motion

Author: Eadweard Muybridge

Publisher: Courier Corporation

Published: 2012-09-24

Total Pages: 416

ISBN-13: 0486129993

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More than 4,000 photographs in series and stopped action of horses, cats, lions, deer, kangaroos, etc. Indispensable for animal artists. Classic of 19th-century photography. "Impressive and valuable collection." — Scientific American.

Winter In Volcano

Author: Gary Kissick

Publisher: Random House

Published: 2012-01-31

Total Pages: 294

ISBN-13: 1448135400

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'Her name was Felicia, a name Cullen liked. He wondered as he sipped his beer, what ancestral dance had produced such impish racoon eyes -eyes she was fond of hiding behind oversized sunglasses that only served to emphasise her nose, a perfect minature. And what, he wondered, might be the genealogy of that wickedly sullen mouth?' Cullen Kinnell, precariously employed by a small Catholic college in Honolulu, commits a fatal error. He falls for one of his students -Felicia Mattos. Cullen Kinnell is an intelligent man and old enough to know better than to play with fire. Gary Kissick's witty and richly expressive first novel explores how unsuitable love can cause an eruption of conflicting emotions, from which no one emerges unscathed.

Biology, Medicine, and Surgery of Elephants

Author: Murray Fowler

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2008-01-09

Total Pages: 597

ISBN-13: 0470344113

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Elephants are possibly the most well-known members of the animal kingdom. The enormous size, unusual anatomy, and longevity of elephants have fascinated humans for millenia. Biology, Medicine, and Surgery of Elephants serves as a comprehensive text on elephant medicine and surgery. Based on the expertise of 36 scientists and clinical veterinarians, this volume covers biology, husbandry, veterinary medicine and surgery of the elephant as known today. Written by the foremost experts in the field Comprehensively covers both Asian and African elephants Complete with taxonomy, behavioral, geographical and systemic information Well-illustrated and organized for easy reference

To the Elephant Graveyard

Author: Tarquin Hall

Publisher: Grove Press

Published: 2020-03-03

Total Pages: 248

ISBN-13: 0802158382

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“Introduces us to the darker side of the Asian elephant. It is more of a thriller than a straightforward travel book . . . insightful and sensitive.” —Literary Review On India’s northeast frontier, a killer elephant is on the rampage, stalking Assam’s paddy fields and murdering dozens of farmers. Local forestry officials, powerless to stop the elephant, call in one of India’s last licensed elephant hunters and issue a warrant for the rogue’s destruction. Reading about the ensuing hunt in a Delhi newspaper, journalist Tarquin Hall flies to Assam to investigate. To the Elephant Graveyard is the compelling account of the search for a killer elephant in the northeast corner of India, and a vivid portrait of the Khasi tribe, who live intimately with the elephants. Though it seems a world of peaceful coexistence between man and beast, Hall begins to see that the elephants are suffering, having lost their natural habitat to the destruction of the forests and modernization. Hungry, confused, and with little forest left to hide in, herds of elephants are slowly adapting to domestication, but many are resolute and furious. Often spellbinding with excitement, like “a page-turning detective tale” (Publishers Weekly), To the Elephant Graveyard is also intimate and moving, as Hall magnificently takes us on a journey to a place whose ancient ways are fast disappearing with the ever-shrinking forest. “Hall is to be congratulated on writing a book that promises humor and adventure, and delivers both.” —The Spectator “Travel writing that wonderfully hits on all cylinders.” —Booklist “A wonderful book that should become a classic.” —Daily Mail

The Exultant Ark

Author: Jonathan Peter Balcombe

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2011-05-09

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 0520948645

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Nature documentaries often depict animal life as a grim struggle for survival, but this visually stunning book opens our eyes to a different, more scientifically up-to-date way of looking at the animal kingdom. In more than one hundred thirty striking images, The Exultant Ark celebrates the full range of animal experience with dramatic portraits of animal pleasure ranging from the charismatic and familiar to the obscure and bizarre. These photographs, windows onto the inner lives of pleasure seekers, show two polar bears engaged in a bout of wrestling, hoary marmots taking time for a friendly chase, Japanese macaques enjoying a soak in a hot spring, a young bull elk sticking out his tongue to catch snowflakes, and many other rewarding moments. Biologist and best-selling author Jonathan Balcombe is our guide, interpreting the images within the scientific context of what is known about animal behavior. In the end, old attitudes fall away as we gain a heightened sense of animal individuality and of the pleasures that make life worth living for all sentient beings.