Entertaining reviews

Via a Pharyngula thread, several less-than-entirely-serious Amazon reviews.

Hermit Crabs: Complete Owner's Manual

I actually bought this book by mistake - I have a dog - but found it a fascinating and hugely informative read. I am now a convert! The very next day I went out and bought a small garbage can which I roped up to the hind-quarters of my Spaniel Barry. Barry loves it; he has arthritis in his rear legs anyway and he enjoys pulling himself around in his garbage can, and I get a dog hermit crab.

I think we have to accept here that the shell is nothing mroe than a metaphor for the banality of existance and the transformation of life into the realm of the "HYPERREAL" (re: Derrida, Baudrillard, Eco). Clearly the primal needs of the "animal with in us" (ie, marcuse) are represented by the twigs/rock/algae required by the thing-in-itself (ie, "crab") whereas we must view the struggle inherent in the replacement of the shell as a transferance from one phase of life to the next, as well as the perception/truth metamorphasis of such (re: Kant). Here SUe Fox informs us of the process we can anticipate (spiritually?metaphysically?) in a standard epistomological framework. Excellent work.

Fungi and Biotechnology: Recent Advances (International Bioscience Series, V. 16) (Hardcover)

This is a well-written and well researched book on fungi and biotechnology. Dude knows his 'shrooms.

The Ancestor's Tale : A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution

This is a detailed and meticulous description of evolution and the history of biological life. Of its type, this is one of the most comprehensive and readable accounts available. Unfortunately Dawkins is operating entirely within the wrong paradigm!

Creation may be contradicted by facts, but facts don't necessarily add up to truth. Evolution itself is flawed on several counts, for example it cannot explain:

1) Why heavy fish, like whales, don't just sink to the bottom of the ocean
2) Why most trees are so much taller than necessary
3) How non-biological animals, like crocodiles and ostriches, came into existence
4) Why sharks haven't grown legs, moved onto land and taken over the world
5) The existence of invisible species that remain undiscovered

So go ahead and read Dawkins' lucid prose in 'The Ancestor's Tale' - but remember there are some occasions when facts are wrong.

WWJD?

Kansas professor beaten for denigrating 'intelligent design':

Kansas University religious studies professor Paul Mirecki reported he was beaten by two men about 6:40 a.m. today on a roadside in rural Douglas County. In a series of interviews late this afternoon, Mirecki said the men who beat him were making references to the controversy that has propelled him into the headlines in recent weeks.

“I didn’t know them, but I’m sure they knew me,” he said.

Mirecki said he was driving to breakfast when he noticed the men tailgating him in a pickup truck.

“I just pulled over hoping they would pass, and then they pulled up real close behind,” he said. “They got out, and I made the mistake of getting out.”

He said the men beat him about the upper body with their fists, and he said he thinks they struck him with a metal object. He was treated and released at Lawrence Memorial Hospital...