The Ed's Up #141
Book news
I Contain Multitudes is just two months way from publication. Last week, Wired included it on its list of 14 must-read books for the summer, describing it as " beautiful and terrifying". Which is basically my oeuvre in three words. I'm delighted to share the list with Jeff Vandermeer's upcoming sci-fi anthology, Teju Cole's essay collection, Mary Roach's book on the weird science of war, and Emma Cline's novel on the feminine gaze. I'm pre-ordering all of those; you can do the same for mine here.
Before the Hobbits There Were Smaller Hobbits
"Then, on 8th October 2014, the penultimate week of the project’s last year, they finally hit paydirt. Supervisor Mika Puspaningram was looking through the day’s haul when she saw what was clearly a human tooth. It had come from a layer of sandstone that, in quick succession, yielded five more teeth and a jaw fragment, from at least three different people. The specimens are small in size and few in number, but they have a big story to tell. They’re around 700,000 years old, which makes them 10 times as old as the hobbit. Based on their shapes, it seems likely that they belonged to the great-great-great-etc-grand uncles and aunts of the Liang Bua hobbits, and were part of the same species—Homo floresiensis. “It’s like the ancestor of the hobbit… is the hobbit,” says Brumm." (Image: Kinez Riza) 
The Stunning Case of Leaping Electric Eels
"When Ken Catania from Vanderbilt University started studying the eels a few years ago, he too doubted the stories. Then, one day, while trying to herd a reticent eel into a net, the animal suddenly went on the offensive. In an explosive burst, it swam up the handle of the net, partially leaving the water and heading straight for Catania’s hand. Pressing its chin against the handle, it delivered its trademark shocks—rapid trains of 600-volt pulses that can stun small fish and incapacitate humans (or horses). “Despite wearing a [rubber] glove, it was pretty intimidating,” says Catania. “I made a little note to myself to come back and study this.”" (Image: Rava51)
The Very Long War Between Snakes and Newts
"In the mountains of Oregon, there are newts with so much poison in their skin that each could kill a roomful of people. There are also snakes that eat those newts; they’re completely resistant to the toxins. The two are locked in an evolutionary arms race. As the newts become more toxic, the snakes become more resistant. One team of scientists has been studying this evolutionary conflict for five decades, and they’ve now shown that its seeds were planted 170 million years ago—before either snakes or newts even existed." (Richard Greene) 
This Squid Has Glowing Eyeshadow That Acts Like An Invisibility Cloak
"“I remember sitting in my office comparing the two, and my jaw dropped,” says Sweeney. “I thought there must have been a mistake and we couldn’t possibly have been that lucky the first time round. But we were.” The glass squid’s photophores are omnidirectional invisibility cloaks. They obscure the animal’s eyes by perfectly matching the light coming in from everydirection (at least, in the lower half)."
The Surprising History of Glowing Fish
"During the Cretaceous period, while flowers and tyrant dinosaurs were spreading over the land, and pterosaurs and birds were taking over the skies, in the oceans, fish were starting to glow. Today, some 1,500 fish species are bioluminescent—able to make their own light. They have luminous fishing lures coming out of their heads, glowing stripes on their flanks, bright goatees dangling from their chins, flashing headlamps beneath their eyes, or radiant bellies that cancel out their silhouettes to predators watching from below." (Image: Matt Davis)
More good reads
- “These artificial meteors will be dropped by satellite.” Geoff Manaugh on the coming age of fake stars.
- “I’m a recovering addict. So why did my doctors give me opioids and leave me on my own?” An honest and harrowing account by Seth Mnookin.
- A story from a time when people were described as computers and rocket science was considered dumb. By Nathalia Holt
- Stop harshing on the dodo, says Emily Anthes. It wasn’t dumb, incompetent, or slow.
- In which Adrienne LaFrance trained a neural network (an Androidienne?) on her own work and proved that her job is safe.
- This is sort of about Ghostbusters but mostly about the art of comedy editing. By Tony Zhou
- “You don’t know me, but you’ve been inside me, and that’s why we’re here today.” Here’s the full statement that the Stanford rape victim read to her attacker.
- There’s no such thing as pristine nature, argues Michelle Nijhuis.
- Do gorillas even belong in zoos? A well-reported analysis by Natalie Angier
- And finally… a living fish photographed swimming inside a jelllyfish
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And that's it! Thanks for reading.
-Ed