Lost world of fanged frogs and giant rats discovered in Papua New Guinea

Started by japanesebaby, September 08, 2009, 19:15:08

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japanesebaby

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/sep/07/discovery-species-papua-new-guinea


A lost world populated by fanged frogs, grunting fish and tiny bear-like creatures has been discovered in a remote volcanic crater on the Pacific island of Papua New Guinea.

A team of scientists from Britain, the United States and Papua New Guinea found more than 40 previously unidentified species when they climbed into the kilometre-deep crater of Mount Bosavi and explored a pristine jungle habitat teeming with life that has evolved in isolation since the volcano last erupted 200,000 years ago. In a remarkably rich haul from just five weeks of exploration, the biologists discovered 16 frogs which have never before been recorded by science, at least three new fish, a new bat and a giant rat, which may turn out to be the biggest in the world.

The discoveries are being seen as fresh evidence of the richness of the world's rainforests and the explorers hope their finds will add weight to calls for international action to prevent the demise of similar ecosystems. They said Papua New Guinea's rainforest is currently being destroyed at the rate of 3.5% a year.

"It was mind-blowing to be there and it is clearly time we pulled our finger out and decided these habitats are worth us saving," said Dr George McGavin who headed the expedition.

The team of biologists included experts from Oxford University, the London Zoo and the Smithsonian Institution and are believed to be the first scientists to enter the mountainous Bosavi crater. They were joined by members of the BBC Natural History Unit which filmed the expedition for a three-part documentary which starts tomorrow night.

They found the three-kilometre wide crater populated by spectacular birds of paradise and in the absence of big cats and monkeys, which are found in the remote jungles of the Amazon and Sumatra, the main predators are giant monitor lizards while kangaroos have evolved to live in trees. New species include a camouflaged gecko, a fanged frog and a fish called the Henamo grunter, named because it makes grunting noises from its swim bladder.

"These discoveries are really significant," said Steve Backshall, a climber and naturalist who became so friendly with the never-before seen Bosavi silky cuscus, a marsupial that lives up trees and feeds on fruits and leaves, that it sat on his shoulder.

"The world is getting an awful lot smaller and it is getting very hard to find places that are so far off the beaten track."

gallery: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/gallery/2009/sep/06/wildlife-endangeredspecies


certainly sensational news for scientists. but somehow it makes me think that maybe the explorers should have kept it a secret...
i bet the woolly rats and fanged frogs would be much better off if the world never knew about them at all.
Ay, in the very temple of Delight
Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine

crowbi_wan

I saw this article early today.  Pretty fascinating news.  What was it, something like 40 new critters?!  It amazes me that so many new animals were found, and in one area.  Just read the last sentence...

"The world is getting an awful lot smaller and it is getting very hard to find places that are so far off the beaten track."


So true.  And to find something like this?  Amazing!     

jbud1980

granted most scientists are well, dorks, but being the first (that we know of) to discover something like this probably makes all the wedgies and date-less nights worth it.  ;)

japanesebaby

Quote from: jbud1980 on September 09, 2009, 15:58:46
granted most scientists are well, dorks, but being the first (that we know of) to discover something like this probably makes all the wedgies and date-less nights worth it.  ;)

well, i know a lot of musicians (both personally and professionally) who are absolute dorks - hey not to mention some brett michaels needs a reality tv show in order to find a date.... LOL

so.... there are dorks everywhere.
at least scientists usually have some brains to balance it out, if they should happen to be dorks. many musicians for instance don't have even that.


Ay, in the very temple of Delight
Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine

jbud1980

Quote from: japanesebaby on September 10, 2009, 10:56:56
Quote from: jbud1980 on September 09, 2009, 15:58:46
granted most scientists are well, dorks, but being the first (that we know of) to discover something like this probably makes all the wedgies and date-less nights worth it.  ;)

well, i know a lot of musicians (both personally and professionally) who are absolute dorks - hey not to mention some brett michaels needs a reality tv show in order to find a date.... LOL

so.... there are dorks everywhere.
at least scientists usually have some brains to balance it out, if they should happen to be dorks. many musicians for instance don't have even that.





while i whole-heartedly support your opinion, i must state that an education is not indicative of intelligence (or having a brain). for instance, how hard is it to regurgitate information to do well on an exam? as i am sure u are aware, a formal education is pretty much a dime-a-dozen, yet brilliant musicians (the cure, zeppelin, the mars volta, NIN, etc.) are far and few between.

japanesebaby

Quote from: jbud1980 on September 12, 2009, 21:14:02
Quote from: japanesebaby on September 10, 2009, 10:56:56
Quote from: jbud1980 on September 09, 2009, 15:58:46
granted most scientists are well, dorks, but being the first (that we know of) to discover something like this probably makes all the wedgies and date-less nights worth it.  ;)

well, i know a lot of musicians (both personally and professionally) who are absolute dorks - hey not to mention some brett michaels needs a reality tv show in order to find a date.... LOL

so.... there are dorks everywhere.
at least scientists usually have some brains to balance it out, if they should happen to be dorks. many musicians for instance don't have even that.





while i whole-heartedly support your opinion, i must state that an education is not indicative of intelligence (or having a brain). for instance, how hard is it to regurgitate information to do well on an exam? as i am sure u are aware, a formal education is pretty much a dime-a-dozen, yet brilliant musicians (the cure, zeppelin, the mars volta, NIN, etc.) are far and few between.


i'm sorry but i simply cannot agree with the point of view that scientist had brains & they were good in memorizing stuff just so that they could "balance out" some kind of lack of creativity(?). that's simply not true. would einstein have been able to come up with the theory of relativity if he had only been memorizing others people's work? hardly. so he was just as damn creative as michelangelo or da vinci or whoever.

the "real" and committed study (in any field, be it science or something else - could be music too) is hardly just "regurgitating information to do well on exams".  that's what you do at school. what you do at school has nothing to do with any real study - that i can say from personal experience, i think. school is memorizing stuff, yes, and on some lines of study it really helps if memorizing is easy for you. but nobody becomes a successful scientist just because he or she knows how to memorize.

because if what you are saying was true, it would mean that all scholars were just repeating something that is already known/something that some other scholar already said. surely there's a certain amount of that too, but if you were asking every scientist to invent their own theories for everything and never ever quote anyone else, then it's pretty much the same as if you told a musician never to use this or that chord structure because it has already been used in some other song. see?
so the real point of all study is to create something new, to find something new, whether it's new ways of thinking or new findings (like in this case). you can say it's a question of intelligence but it's mostly a question of creativity: intelligence alone is nothing unless you know how to use it.
so, every real scientist must be a deeply intuitive and a deeply creative person too - just as creative and instinctive as any good artist.


that was what my example about dumb musicians was about: there are creative people in every line of serious study (and by that i mean all kinds of arts and science - because they are actually pretty much the same in nature when you look at it from the point of view of creativity - there is really no difference). and those artists and scientists who are creative are also the ones that achieve something/the ones that we remember. and sure, they are all few. and then there are people who just aren't really creative and can only copy from others - and these are pretty numerous. BUT they are numerous on all kinds of fields. there are musicians who just memorize a lot of music that other people wrote, memorize a lot of chord sequences and rhythm (and i mean a lot: you could fill a couple of phone directories of that stuff sometimes). and then they just go and **** through their "own" songs, just repeating what they've heard elsewhere. and should we still call them "creative people", just because they happen to know how to play some instrument? certainly not.
and i also know this from a personal experience, i know really creative people who you could call scientists and i know really anti-creative people who still work as musicians/artists - the first ones are brilliant in what they do, the second ones can only copy others.
anyway, it's really not a question of "scientists = brains & memorizing; artists = creativity & inventiveness". that just doesn't make sense, sorry.

Ay, in the very temple of Delight
Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine

jbud1980

Quote from: japanesebaby on September 13, 2009, 17:52:18
Quote from: jbud1980 on September 12, 2009, 21:14:02
Quote from: japanesebaby on September 10, 2009, 10:56:56
Quote from: jbud1980 on September 09, 2009, 15:58:46
granted most scientists are well, dorks, but being the first (that we know of) to discover something like this probably makes all the wedgies and date-less nights worth it.  ;)

well, i know a lot of musicians (both personally and professionally) who are absolute dorks - hey not to mention some brett michaels needs a reality tv show in order to find a date.... LOL

so.... there are dorks everywhere.
at least scientists usually have some brains to balance it out, if they should happen to be dorks. many musicians for instance don't have even that.





while i whole-heartedly support your opinion, i must state that an education is not indicative of intelligence (or having a brain). for instance, how hard is it to regurgitate information to do well on an exam? as i am sure u are aware, a formal education is pretty much a dime-a-dozen, yet brilliant musicians (the cure, zeppelin, the mars volta, NIN, etc.) are far and few between.


i'm sorry but i simply cannot agree with the point of view that scientist had brains & they were good in memorizing stuff just so that they could "balance out" some kind of lack of creativity(?). that's simply not true. would einstein have been able to come up with the theory of relativity if he had only been memorizing others people's work? hardly. so he was just as damn creative as michelangelo or da vinci or whoever.

the "real" and committed study (in any field, be it science or something else - could be music too) is hardly just "regurgitating information to do well on exams".  that's what you do at school. what you do at school has nothing to do with any real study - that i can say from personal experience, i think. school is memorizing stuff, yes, and on some lines of study it really helps if memorizing is easy for you. but nobody becomes a successful scientist just because he or she knows how to memorize.

because if what you are saying was true, it would mean that all scholars were just repeating something that is already known/something that some other scholar already said. surely there's a certain amount of that too, but if you were asking every scientist to invent their own theories for everything and never ever quote anyone else, then it's pretty much the same as if you told a musician never to use this or that chord structure because it has already been used in some other song. see?
so the real point of all study is to create something new, to find something new, whether it's new ways of thinking or new findings (like in this case). you can say it's a question of intelligence but it's mostly a question of creativity: intelligence alone is nothing unless you know how to use it.
so, every real scientist must be a deeply intuitive and a deeply creative person too - just as creative and instinctive as any good artist.


that was what my example about dumb musicians was about: there are creative people in every line of serious study (and by that i mean all kinds of arts and science - because they are actually pretty much the same in nature when you look at it from the point of view of creativity - there is really no difference). and those artists and scientists who are creative are also the ones that achieve something/the ones that we remember. and sure, they are all few. and then there are people who just aren't really creative and can only copy from others - and these are pretty numerous. BUT they are numerous on all kinds of fields. there are musicians who just memorize a lot of music that other people wrote, memorize a lot of chord sequences and rhythm (and i mean a lot: you could fill a couple of phone directories of that stuff sometimes). and then they just go and **** through their "own" songs, just repeating what they've heard elsewhere. and should we still call them "creative people", just because they happen to know how to play some instrument? certainly not.
and i also know this from a personal experience, i know really creative people who you could call scientists and i know really anti-creative people who still work as musicians/artists - the first ones are brilliant in what they do, the second ones can only copy others.
anyway, it's really not a question of "scientists = brains & memorizing; artists = creativity & inventiveness". that just doesn't make sense, sorry.



i definitely appreciate your opinion and how heart-felt your responses have been, but in the second paragraph i wrote above, i never mentioned anything about scientist's, nor have i ever generalized about their intelligence. the definition you have given intelligence does not correlate with mine, but that is ok, because we r entitled to our own opinions. of course i think scientist's who find cures to diseases/viruses are brilliant. all i am saying is that i have yet to see a stephen hawking play the guitar just as good as hendrix, and vice versa. intelligence cannot be segregated to those with a formal education. creativity, intuitiveness, etc. is a separate...argument (don't really want to start something, but i think this would be a great conversation over drinks :)).

Eire

Quote from: jbud1980 on September 15, 2009, 23:55:39

...i have yet to see a stephen hawking play the guitar just as good as hendrix, and vice versa....

...Hey, by the way, Brian May of Queen is not only ranked the 39th greatest guitar player of all time by Rolling Stone magazine, but he also has a PhD and is also an astrophysicist! lol

jbud1980

Quote from: Eire on September 17, 2009, 02:11:30
Quote from: jbud1980 on September 15, 2009, 23:55:39

...i have yet to see a stephen hawking play the guitar just as good as hendrix, and vice versa....

...Hey, by the way, Brian May of Queen is not only ranked the 39th greatest guitar player of all time by Rolling Stone magazine, but he also has a PhD and is also an astrophysicist! lol

lol, yep, and there is always an exception to the rule.  :smth023

also, didn't tom morello of rage against the machine graduate from harvard?

japanesebaby

Quote from: jbud1980 on September 15, 2009, 23:55:39
all i am saying is that i have yet to see a stephen hawking play the guitar just as good as hendrix, and vice versa. intelligence cannot be segregated to those with a formal education. creativity, intuitiveness, etc. is a separate...argument (don't really want to start something, but i think this would be a great conversation over drinks :)).

actually, you are misreading me now. if you read what i was saying... (or maybe i was't clear enough then), i was never saying intelligence equals formal education. i was actually trying to say something totally on the contrary: wasn't i saying that i know people with formal education who are brilliant minds but otherwise complete idiots and that i know people who are great musicians but also idiots. and vice versa, intelligent people on both sides. so there are intelligent people AND idiots in EVERY field, regardless of whether or not they have formal education. about my examples about creativity: what i wanted to say was that a guitar player simply isn't any more creative mind than someone working on astrophysics - considering both are good at what they do. i totally object the stereotypical idea that artists are somehow more creative than other people. and i think i can say that since i've always work with art/music myself so i sort of dare to say it.
creativity is something a lot more than just being able to express oneself in the standard mediums of art: music, painting, film, etc. creativity is not something limited to those fields and something "possessed" only by people who work on those mediums.

so, actually i felt like you were segragating things when you were talking about scientists just like all of them were nerds with no life. that implies that people who play guitar have fuller life (and more creative life) than those scientists do. and that's just not true. who are we to judge it anyway? and that has nothing to do with the definition of intelligence by the way.

i just felt that in your first post you were slagging off people with scientific/formal education in a pretty stereotypical wayand i wanted to say i don't agree with that.


and hats off to brian may (thanks for the example Eire).
that's exactly what i mean: people who are truly creative are NOT limited to mediums of music/art/etc. IF they are truly creative minds, they can be creative in other fields too, If they just want to.
and therefore one simply cannot say a person with formal education isn't creative until he also knows how to play a guitar like a semi-god. one could just as well say that a guitarist isn't creative until he's ALSO got a diploma in astrophysics or something.
it works both ways.
Ay, in the very temple of Delight
Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine