What Is That? Hoag-Type Galaxies
It hasn’t been too long ago that we humans thought that our galaxy was the entire universe. Edwin Hubble discovered that this is far from the case only in 1925. Since then we’ve come to realize that there are almost an inconceivable number of galaxies floating around in the the …
Cryptophile: Hobbits
Welcome to cryptophile, the series in which I discuss fantastical creatures and the biological mechanisms that might or might not make them plausible. In my always-timely fashion it’s only been over three months since my last post. Evidently being unemployed does not necessarily mean you have time on your hands. …
Bird’s do it, Bees do it even- Wait?! How exactly do bees do it???
Well bees or to be more exact Honeybees “do it” mid flight, in a massive swarm and several endophallus’s get blown off. Okay so that was pretty vague if intriguing and I can hear you begging for the gory details. Well unfortunately for you, exploding endophallus’s aside Honeybee mating isn’t …
New Book Series! Sex Ed with James Dobson
I’ve mentioned before that I grew up in a fundamentalist lite Christian sect, so as one might expect, my sex education was a little lacking. I had a picture book aimed at seven year olds called Where did I come from and a body atlas that I pored over the lower …
Sex is weird: The Australian Redback Spider
CW: I only talk about spider sex, there aren’t any pictures of them for anyone with a phobia! Hey guys, so last time I was talking about the evolution of sex (one of my favourite topics) so I thought I’d crack on with some fun case studies of where sex …
The Best Museum You Never Knew Existed is in Oklahoma City
You may have noticed a lack of Physics Philes for the past several weeks. That’s because I’ve been at the University of Oklahoma as a participant in their physics REU. REUs, or Research Experience for Undergraduates, are great and if you have the opportunity you should definitely participate in one. …
The Evolution of Sex
Sex is confusing and not only in the figuring out what goes where and who, if indeed anyone, you want to do it with. It’s very existence is a problem that has puzzled evolutionary biologists for centuries. For all intents and purposes sex shouldn’t exist, let alone be intrinsic to …
Cryptophile: Griffins
Here at the Skepchick network we love using magical creatures as an excuse to talk about biology. I did it at TS with Tolkien’s giant eagles, Mad Art Lab did it with dragons, and, because it was so much fun, I’ve decided to run with it and start a series …