NYT Science Times: Flamingos, bisexual men & collateral damage from commercial fishing. But wait, there’s more.
Science Times's lead image
What color is a flamingo? Natalie Angier answers that question six ways in her lead piece in today’s Science Times: orangesicle, Necco-pink, “Miami Vice” bright, fiery, pink-orange and baseline blush. (At least I think that last one’s a color.) And the wonderful stock photo close-up of flamingo plumage that takes up almost all the acreage above the fold adds its own visual statement of color which, as anyone can see in the picture here, includes white.
Though replete with Angier’s usual writerly flourishes, the piece is thin on science. What science there is amounts to raising questions that can be raised about almost any other bird species. Take this example: “Researchers are not sure why flamingos became such deeply gregarious birds to begin with.” That could be said of penguins, starlings and you-name-it.
But hey, in a weekly feature section, it’s nice to have some easy-going natural history–good for casual readers’ eyes captured by that striking opening image, whatever color it is.
Also fronted is David Tuller‘s report on a study that finds there are bisexual men. Apparently this was in doubt, owing to an earlier study that recruited subjects with ads in gay publications and then asked the men to label themselves as gay, straight or bi. The new study recruited 100 men through ads in bi media and then used sensors to gauge penile arousal as they watched videos of various kinds of sex. No word on what proportion of men are bi, and no evidence of any kind on bisexual women.
On the same page Cornelia Dean, the Times’s seashore and fishery specialist, says that efforts by conservationists to prevent the unintended killing of marine life are finally winning acceptance by the commercial fishing industry.
Inside: Claudia Dreifus interviews Daniel Lieberman, Harvard’s expert on the evolution of the human head and feet; Wallace Ravven (nice to see his byline again) on the fascinating survival strategy of a parasite; Cory Dean again on Maine’s soaring lobster catch and its potential problems.
The whole shebang is here.
-Boyce Rensberger
