Of course I know you're not looking for chameleons, but if you were I'd be very nice about it
I didn't mean it that way, but now that last headline reads like some kind of psychotic challenge. posted by Thomas Nephew at 1:19:00 AM -- |    

 
Looking for chameleons? Use a satellite


To me, this is extremely, triumphantly, hopping-up-and-down cool: scientists from the American Museum of Natural History used archived museum records, satellite imaging, computer mapping (a.k.a. GIS), and genetic algorithms to discover unsuspected chameleon habitats in Madagascar. From NASA's "Earth Observatory" web site, Madagascar's Chameleons:

Raxworthy and his colleagues have been developing predictive models that are based on a combination of satellite observations of environmental characteristics -- such as land cover from NASA's Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer and topography from the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission -- and museum records of locations where biologists and naturalists have spotted different chameleons over the years. [...]

The scientists were initially surprised that for four species, the models predicted that the species lived in areas where no specimens had ever been documented before (bottom row, colored ovals). ... [and] eventually discovered that far from being a mistake, these overlapping "over-predicted" areas actually pointed to locations where new species of chameleon were likely to be discovered.

(The "overpredicted" areas are circled in the figure above.) In the accompanying article Uncovering Chameleons, writer Rebecca Lindsey explains:

To come up with ecological niche models for Madagascar’s chameleons, Raxworthy and his colleagues [used] a genetic algorithm nicknamed GARP (which stands for Genetic Algorithm for Rule-set Prediction).

GARP evaluated the models based on the number of chameleon location points from the original museum records it correctly predicted, as well as by its ability to identify places where the species would not be found. GARP kept evolving the mathematical rules of the survivors and deleting the losers until it produced a single model that it couldn’t improve upon—survival of the fittest.

The real world soon provided confirmation -- of a sort -- for the satellite image-museum data-GARP process:

"At the time this modeling project was going on, we were also identifying chameleon specimens we had collected on previous expeditions to Madagascar," explains Raxworthy, "so the discoveries were going on in parallel universes, so to speak. Then one day I realized that one of the new species we had discovered actually came from an over-predicted area on one of the model’s maps. It finally occurred to me that maybe each of those areas that we thought were model foul-ups could actually be the location of new species".

As the team identified more of the specimens, the number of newly identified species began to mount. In all, the over-predicted areas identified by the models were home to seven new species of chameleon that had never been documented by scientists before. (emphasis added)

My rudimentary evolutionary theory suggests to me the newly identified species occupy ecological niches that might well have otherwise been occupied by those Raxworthy et al focused on (e.g., Brookesia stumpfii, see figure above). It would be interesting to know just how divergent -- genetically and phenotypically -- the newly discovered species are from those 'erroneously' predicted to be there by the GARP process: close cousins? Convergent evolution?

The method Raxworthy et al developed (or at least convincingly demonstrated, I'm not up on this) has obvious applications in ecology and conservation biology at minimum. But it might have applications in sociology and political science as well -- I imagine the thing being modeled doesn't absolutely have to be an evolving entity of its own for GARP etc. to be worth a try. At any rate, an article about all this has been published in Nature,* and I may actually make my way to some university library or other to xerox it.

Waah. Those are the toys I want to play with. Hmmm... maybe I can.


=====
* Christopher J. Raxworthy, Enrique Martinez-Meyer, Ned Horning, Ronald A. Nussbaum, Gregory E. Schneider, Miguel A. Ortega-Huerta2 & A. Townsend Peterson. Predicting distributions of known and unknown reptile species in Madagascar. 2003. Nature 426, 837-841.

UPDATE, 7/6: More genetic algorithms in the news: a German-American team used the technique to optimize network server performance. Via Gary Farber. posted by Thomas Nephew at 11:04:00 PM -- |    

 
Two for a nickel, three for a dime...
Noticed while following up on the Bob Drogin "Curveball" story Kevin Drum alluded to in passing today:

Los Angeles Times: Archives Online Archive Pricing:
Los Angeles Times Annual Pass (200 Articles)...........$149.95..Buy Now!
Los Angeles Times Single Month Pass (15 Articles).......$14.95..Buy Now!
Los Angeles Times 24-Hour Pass (4 Articles)..............$4.95..Buy Now!
Los Angeles Times Document Purchase - Summertime Special $1.00..Buy Now!

OK, it's a special. It's also right around the limit I'm willing to shell out for an article I speculate might be interesting, so the pricing probably doesn't really make sense in non "Summertime Special" days either. posted by Thomas Nephew at 10:38:00 PM -- |    

 
A fitting tribute
The Onion celebrates: Reagan Pyramid Nears Completion

SIMI VALLEY, CA—Slave manpower was doubled this week in an effort to ensure that erection of the gigantic Reagan Pyramid remains on schedule to be completed in time for the 40th president's mummification and ascension into the Afterworld. [...]

'Buried with Reagan will be his finest treasures,' [Reagan administration Attorney General Ed] Meese said, 'including 2,500 MX intercontinental ballistic missiles, 15 stealth bombers, a golden chalice of jelly beans, and his most prized servant, former president George Bush Sr.'

Bush told reporters, 'It is my honor and duty to have my sinus passages ceremonially packed with sand before my still-living, pain-racked body is forever locked with my leader's within the Great Reagan's final resting place. Let us all praise Osiris.'

posted by Thomas Nephew at 10:35:00 PM -- |    

 
Lunar Physics Lab
...is a new blog by Karen Cramer, which I noticed while visiting her sister Kathryn's blog. Karen explains:

The title comes from a proposal I made to the NASA Institute for advanced concepts. There are a lot of ideas about interesting Geology and Astronomy which can be done on the Moon but there has been very little discussion of the possibilities for Physics. I hope this Weblog changes that.

Ms. Cramer has the training to discuss this (she holds a Master's degree in Science Technology and Public Policy with Specialty in Space Policy from the George Washington University), and her site features a very extensive list of links to space exploration sites, technical articles, and more. I look forward to learning more about her idea, which is (obviously) to exploit the moon as a site that is well suited for advanced physics research. I think her idea is smart in identifying both a market (of sorts) and a talent pool for lunar development.

I'm a mere space enthusiast, but have mentioned other notions for the moon in passing, particularly a robot-operated radio telescope array. The more the merrier; I think space exploration is important in its own right, both as a national and as a human enterprise.

I've blogrolled Lunar Physics Lab in my "specialty blogs" list to the left which lists five random narrow-focus blogs like The Panda's Thumb that I've come across. posted by Thomas Nephew at 12:40:00 AM -- |    

 
Then again, maybe not
MSNBC: NATO will send military help to Iraq

A pleasant surprise to me, even if the commitments look somewhat minor and (in Germany's case) noncommittal (+/- "no training in Iraq, only in the UAE"). At any rate, it's more proof that I should check over the news one last time before being unduly optimistic or pessimistic. posted by Thomas Nephew at 2:59:00 AM -- |    

 
"The gradual divorce between Europe and America"
Incidentally, Irish TV (Radio Telefis Eireann) also provided a very good setup to the Bush interview mentioned below -- very good in that it was designed to puncture any smugness a European viewer might have brought to the Bush interview:

[French member of parliament Pierre Lallouche:] What we are seeing, really, is the gradual divorce between Europe and America...It can still be repaired, in many ways, with proper marriage counseling... but it's going to be difficult. [...]

[Voiceover:] But some Europeans know the gulf with George W. Bush's America is not all America's fault. They point to Europe's failures over the Balkans.
[Lallouche:] The war was coming. We knew they were going to kill eachother. Did we do anything to stop it? No. Historians.. will be very severe, because a quarter million people died: women, children, in atrocious fashion, because we just sit there, watch it on television, and wait for the Americans to finally come in and fix it with us.
[Interviewer:] You seem to be confirming all the worst American prejudices that they have about Europe.
[Lallouche:] This is reality.

Likewise, there were these comments by the Washington Post Paris bureau chief, Keith Richburg:

...Iraq is the biggest, obviously, subject, but it's not the only subject, there's a list of subjects. I think a lot of Europeans have the perception that if John Kerry is elected president, that gap is going to narrow. It's not, because I think fundamentally, the Europeans and the Americans are drifting apart.

It's both true and regrettable, I think, that if another crisis were to erupt in the Balkans or some other European frontier, NATO will malfunction -- pace Wesley Clark, it barely functioned in Kosovo. The United States is already well within its rights to draw on or entirely reposition forces in Kosovo and Bosnia to reinforce those in Iraq; given the current state of relations, American troops will not be put in any new harm's way on the European continent for a long time. That may be a welcome development for, say, Milosevic's successors, but not generally.

It seems fair, perhaps, that America's misfortunes should not be (continental) Europe's; by the same token their misfortunes will not be ours. It's really kind of sad, but it seemingly can't be helped. posted by Thomas Nephew at 1:31:00 AM -- |    

 
Bush interview with Irish television
Brett Marston thanked the Irish television reporter Carole Coleman for her interview of President Bush, writing:

It is a sad day when U.S. citizens must turn abroad for truly hard-hitting questioning of our President. That said, thank you very much for your service to folks on this side of the Atlantic as well.

It's true, when we're increasingly starved for questioning of any kind, some actual reporting is all the more welcome.

Brett and others noted Bush's tetchiness as Ms. Coleman asked questions before he (felt he) had enough time to answer the prior one in the fullness of spin and digression he wanted. While that's true, he was effective in a stay-on-message-at-all-costs way, if not an engage-the-listeners-you're-speaking-to way. In her first question, Coleman noted that Irish were "...angry over Abu Ghraib; are you bothered by what Irish people think?" Bush replied:

I hope the Irish people understand the great values of our country, and if they think that a few soldiers represents the entirety of America they don't really understand America then. There've been great ties between Ireland and America, and [we've] got a lot of Irish-Americans here that are very proud of their heritage and their country, but.., you know, they must not understand if they're angry over Abu Ghraib, that they say 'this is what America represents' they don't understand our country, we don't represent that. We're a compassionate country, we're a strong country, we'll defend ourselves, but we help people, and we've helped the Irish and we'll continue to do so. [We've got a] good relationship with Ireland.

So despite document leaks and dumps proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was a pinched-souled administration miserly weighing every shred of compassion to show or not to show to its prisoners, Abu Ghraib was just a "few soldiers," and "we're a compassionate country."

This kind of thing may play well on the Dallas evening news, but you'd think that after Abu Ghraib, American self-congratulation on our virtuousness is not exactly subtle, effective public diplomacy overseas.

Bush had some more effective moments; I'd count both the reminders of mass graves and the story of the Iraqis whose foreheads were branded and hands were cut off (for letting the Iraqi dinar exchange rate slide too far) as on-point reminders of exactly what kind of sovereign nation was invaded in March of last year.

On the other hand, there was something off in the way Bush emphasized how those unfortunates were thankful for the prostheses they'd received in America. I know I'm not the first to comment on this, but George W. Bush makes far too much out of Kodak moments like those, and sets far too great a store in his own supposed purity of heart and that which he sees in others. Again, that may go over well in some situations -- prayer meetings, Oprah Winfrey, Chicken Soup for the Soul chapters -- but those aren't the ones I look to a President for.


=====
UPDATE, 6/28: Kevin Drum follows up on the interview, noting that Bush got all the questions in advance and still got upset when Ms. Coleman pressed for actual answers. Drum also forwards a White House link to a transcript of the interview. posted by Thomas Nephew at 1:06:00 AM -- |    

 
Various and sundry
Category: Deserves More Discussion than I Can Provide

Iraqi blogger Zeyad ("Healing Iraq") has authored a set of high-quality posts under the heading "Iraq's tribal society: A state within a state": 1, 2, 3, 4. The fourth one comes with a map of Iraqi tribal regions. The "Beyond Fallujah" Harper's piece I mentioned a few weeks ago made plain just how critical these tribal loyalties are; together, these articles are helping me get beyond the Shia/Sunni/Kurd oversimplification of Iraqi culture.

Mark Schmitt ("The Decembrist") is writing a series of useful posts on how Kerry might proceed in the early months of his Presidency, all gathered under the topic The 1/21 Project (the day after inauguration). Knock on wood. Schmitt is quite pragmatic in his outlook, which I like. His "1/21" approach is better than the McCain VP notion I kicked around to working with the Republicans of our choosing rather than the ones of their choosing. There are lots of trackbacks to all of the related posts (three so far), which I plan to sample. Found via Yglesias, and a reminder that this is someone on my blogroll who I should read more regularly.


Category: Beautiful Planet

Greatest Places, a project of the Science Museum of Minnesota that provides some very nice photos and streaming video of some beautiful places around the world, such as Brazil's Iguazu Falls. I found this while researching the Conde Nast "Where Is It" contest (which Crickey and I actually won one month last year).

Via Greatest Places, Earth and Moon Viewer, which uses weather information and GIS technology and astronomical software to create views of Earth from various vantage points

The PBS series The Living Edens, which I've loved every time I've had a chance to watch.


Category: Well, it's something

This blog places 3rd on the MSN search engine listing for "helmets of post-war Norway" ...

... and 24th in the Google.it search engine listing for "Where is the Love."

posted by Thomas Nephew at 1:02:00 AM -- |