Just in time for 2006, we’ve set up a dedicated page for Ray Troll’s Devonian Blues, containing even more lobe-finned art.
We’ve also included the lyrics to the song. You inherited your lungs from our Devonian ancestors, so do them proud and sing it loud!
Here’s wishing everyone a Happy and Hairy New Year!
We’ve come once again to the time of year when folks get together and celebrate the birth of a certain Middle-Eastern Fish Man. In keeping with the piscine spirit of the holiday, the Hairy Museum is proud to present work by our resident Curator of Ich-theology, Ray Troll.
Ray’s work takes us back to the Devonian Period (appropriately, “The Age of Fishes”), when a group of lobe-finned fish were taking some of the most radical steps in vertebrate evolution—the shift from an aquatic lifestyle to a terrestrial one. Ray has long been inspired by those who made this great transition, and has created a series of portraits of these notable ancestors, and reflections on what it means to be part of the great lobe-fin family.
After the hustle and bustle of the holiday dies down we’ll get more images up in a dedicated gallery in our expanding Hall of Ich-theology. Until then, however, embrace your inner fish by downloading and playing the following tune, written and performed by Ray in honor of our grand sarcopterygian heritage:
The Devonian Blues
(3.2 MB mp3)
“Your Momma was a lobefinned fish.
My Momma was a lobefinned fish…”
More of Ray’s art, music, and celebration of the fossil record can be found at his outstanding Fin Art website.
Palaeoblog has the heartwarming story of the first coelacanth, or at least the discovery of the first non-fossil coelacanth, discovered during the Christmas season back in 1938.
And Pharyngula has the story (and pictures) of a new specimen of Panderichthys rhombolepis. Panderichthys is another one of these fish on the path to terrestrialism, and this new fossil preserves important details in its lobe-fins that provide insight into how our arms and legs first evolved.
The illustration blog Drawn! and the paleo-blog Palaeoblog have this covered, but the elegant skeletons in the prints and paintings of Dan McCarthy deserve every bit of attention they can get.
Heartening news from Dover, Pennsylvania. U.S. District Judge John E. Jones ruled against the Dover School Board for violating the separation of church and state after it brought “Intelligent Design” into the science classroom. Judge Jones found that Intelligent Design was “inherently religious” with no substance behind its claim of being a “scientific alternative to evolution.”
Pharyngula has been posting choice quotes from Judge Jones’ ruling.
The entirety of the ruling is available as a PDF.
The Panda’s Thumb is flush with posts about the victory.
And the ID promoters at the Discovery Institute have decided that this is a good opportunity to attack the motives of a federal judge, despite their view that his decision has nothing to do with them and is ultimately unimportant, anyway. I wonder if they could possibly spin any faster…