Welcome back NF, not Ivory-billed Woodpecker
Welcome home NF! Sorry today's news isn't so welcoming, though. As you can see from the story below, 61 years of believing we were successful in driving this pesky species to extinction have come to a crashing end. Looks like we better book a flight to Arkansas... --EG

A group of wildlife scientists believe the ivory-billed woodpecker is not extinct. They say they have made seven firm sightings of the bird in central Arkansas. The landmark find caps a search that began more than 60 years ago, after biologists said North America’s largest woodpecker had become extinct in the United States.

The large, showy bird is an American legend -- it disappeared when the big bottomland forests of North America were logged, and relentless searches have produced only false alarms. Now, in an intensive year-long search in the Cache River and White River national wildlife refuges involving more than 50 experts and field biologists working together as part of the Big Woods Partnership, an ivory-billed male has been captured on video.

"We have solid evidence, there are solid sightings, this bird is here," says Tim Barksdale, a wildlife photographer and biologist.

- Owen, 8:50 AM | (1) comments |

 
Finland to receive CHL achievement award
The number of endangered species is on the up in Finland. The Ministry of the Environment's suggestion for the new nature conservation act includes a list of 1,410 endangered species. The current number is 1,300.

According to the proposal, the number of species in need of special protection should grow from 485 to 608. Among the species now considered endangered are Temminck's stint (Calidris temminckii) from the sandpiper family, and the controversial barred warbler (Sylvia nisoria) that came to public attention over the Vuosaari Harbour construction project.

According to Hannu Karjalainen from the Ministry of the Environment, the increase in the number of species in need of protection speaks of regression.

"In general, one could say that the diversity of the Finnish natural environment is being compromised", Karjalainen says.

Karjalainen will be receiving the prestigious Award for Achievement in Homogenization in a ceremony at the CHL's Helsinki offices next week.
- Owen, 6:54 AM | (0) comments |

 
Scientific American: Okay, We Give Up
EDITOR'S NOTE: We here at the CHL are very happy to see that Scientific American has finally come around. We need more of the type of fair-and-balanced science reporting that they advocate in the following excerpt from their editorial page. It seems that they feel such the fools for their years of lopsided, biased reporting that they turned over a new leaf on April Fool's Day. We applaud them for their honesty and look forward to working with the new SA editors toward our common goals.

Tuesday, March 22, 2005

There's no easy way to admit this. For years, helpful letter writers told us to stick to science. They pointed out that science and politics don't mix. They said we should be more balanced in our presentation of such issues as creationism, missile defense and global warming. We resisted their advice and pretended not to be stung by the accusations that the magazine should be renamed Unscientific American, or Scientific Unamerican, or even Unscientific Unamerican. But spring is in the air, and all of nature is turning over a new leaf, so there's no better time to say: you were right, and we were wrong.

In retrospect, this magazine's coverage of so-called evolution has been hideously one-sided. For decades, we published articles in every issue that endorsed the ideas of Charles Darwin and his cronies. True, the theory of common descent through natural selection has been called the unifying concept for all of biology and one of the greatest scientific ideas of all time, but that was no excuse to be fanatics about it.

Where were the answering articles presenting the powerful case for scientific creationism? Why were we so unwilling to suggest that dinosaurs lived 6,000 years ago or that a cataclysmic flood carved the Grand Canyon? Blame the scientists. They dazzled us with their fancy fossils, their radiocarbon dating and their tens of thousands of peer-reviewed journal articles. As editors, we had no business being persuaded by mountains of evidence.

Moreover, we shamefully mistreated the Intelligent Design (ID) theorists by lumping them in with creationists. Creationists believe that God designed all life, and that's a somewhat religious idea. But ID theorists think that at unspecified times some unnamed superpowerful entity designed life, or maybe just some species, or maybe just some of the stuff in cells. That's what makes ID a superior scientific theory: it doesn't get bogged down in details.

Good journalism values balance above all else. We owe it to our readers to present everybody's ideas equally and not to ignore or discredit theories simply because they lack scientifically credible arguments or facts. Nor should we succumb to the easy mistake of thinking that scientists understand their fields better than, say, U.S. senators or best-selling novelists do. Indeed, if politicians or special-interest groups say things that seem untrue or misleading, our duty as journalists is to quote them without comment or contradiction. To do otherwise would be elitist and therefore wrong. In that spirit, we will end the practice of expressing our own views in this space: an editorial page is no place for opinions.

Get ready for a new Scientific American. No more discussions of how science should inform policy. If the government commits blindly to building an anti-ICBM defense system that can't work as promised, that will waste tens of billions of taxpayers' dollars and imperil national security, you won't hear about it from us. If studies suggest that the administration's antipollution measures would actually increase the dangerous particulates that people breathe during the next two decades, that's not our concern. No more discussions of how policies affect science either; so what if the budget for the National Science Foundation is slashed? This magazine will be dedicated purely to science, fair and balanced science, and not just the science that scientists say is science. And it will start on April Fools' Day.

Okay, We Give Up

MATT COLLINS
THE EDITORS
COPYRIGHT 2005 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, INC.

- Owen, 7:54 AM | (0) comments |

 
I'm not in a Funk
Dear Volunteeers,

I will spend most of April on a clandestine mission in what is currently recognized as the most biodiverse place on the planet. This is my last post for the month of April--I expect to have an awesome report by May 1.

Cheers,

Nostradamus Funkadelic
- nostradamusfunkadelic, 3:11 PM | (0) comments |