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Evolution

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Katy Perry - Roar (Lyric Video) Now that’s a crab. Update: Reader Dennis Hansen, a biologist who works on the Indian Ocean island of Aldabra in the Seychelles, which (like the Galapagos) has giant tortoises, sends three coconut crab photos and a note: Here’s a few photos of coconut crabs from Aldabra, for your perusal. They leave the giant tortoises alone, it seems. At least until a tortoise dies, by which time the crabs tear it apart from the inside. When staying in one of the remote field camps on the atoll, they do what they can to rob us of our meagre field rations, though.

This photo and caption are from Professor Brian Cox’s Facebook page, and apparently appear in his new book, Wonders of Life with the caption: “These animals are known locally as robber crabs on their native Christmas Island because they have a reputation for curiosity and for stealing things. Actually, I know these beasts by the name “coconut crab,” but their scientific name is Bigus latro (“Bigus” is right!). Here’s a video of one carrying his coconut prize: How Your Cat Is Making You Crazy - Kathleen McAuliffe. No one would accuse Jaroslav Flegr of being a conformist. A self-described “sloppy dresser,” the 53-year-old Czech scientist has the contemplative air of someone habitually lost in thought, and his still-youthful, square-jawed face is framed by frizzy red hair that encircles his head like a ring of fire. Certainly Flegr’s thinking is jarringly unconventional.

Starting in the early 1990s, he began to suspect that a single-celled parasite in the protozoan family was subtly manipulating his personality, causing him to behave in strange, often self-destructive ways. And if it was messing with his mind, he reasoned, it was probably doing the same to others. The parasite, which is excreted by cats in their feces, is called Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii or Toxo for short) and is the microbe that causes toxoplasmosis—the reason pregnant women are told to avoid cats’ litter boxes. But after years of being ignored or discounted, Flegr is starting to gain respectability.

The psychiatrist E. BBC Two - Natural World, 2010-2011, Chimps of the Lost Gorge. Cousins of Neanderthals Left DNA in Africa, Scientists Report.