There comes a moment in New England woodlands in the spring when up through last season’s decaying leaves and pine needles comes the first green. Like a carpet rolled out overnight, suddenly the greedy leaves of the Canada mayflower are everywhere.
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Canada mayflower • Photo by Dr. Thomas G. Barnes, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Public Domain)
The Pioneer Plaque attached to the spacecraft before launch • NASA (Public Domain)
Spacecraft carry Earth’s goodwill
Remember 1972?
Photo by Jeffrey Hamilton on Unsplash
Lessons learned from the lichen
“There is a low mist in the woods. It is a good day to study lichens,” wrote Henry David Thoreau in his journal on the last day of 1851. To tell the truth, any day is a good day to study lichens, as Thoreau would have acknowledged.
New York City from above • NASA (Public Domain)
The masking of the heavens dims our age of enlightenment
A few weeks ago I flew from Miami to Boston on a clear, dark night.
“The Entry of the Crusaders into Constantinople” by Eugène Delacroix (1840)
When religion subverts science
Question: Who said, “Whenever [one] hears [our] religion abused, he should not attempt to defend its tenets, except with his sword, and that he should thrust into the scoundrel’s belly, as far as it will enter”?
Photo by Nikola Jovanovic on Unsplash
Future awaits ethical decisions
The Earth’s biosphere has no more ardent champion than Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson.
Photo by Mike Marrah on Unsplash
Can we use it all and still have it?
We have no shortage of gurus willing to lead us into the environmental future.
Photo by Kier In Sight on Unsplash
Life’s sweet beginnings
“How sweet it is,” said Jackie Gleason. Yes, life is sweet. Sugar is a key ingredient of all life on earth and has been since the beginning.
A sandfly • Photo by Emilio Floris (Public Domain)
Finding beauty in the beasts
The tropics are a wonderful place to consider our relationship with other species. I mean, you can hardly help it. Things that creep, slither, fly, or crawl invariably show up where you least expect them.
Photo by Dukas Lu (CC BY-NC 2.0)
A new finale for ‘Creation’
Two centuries have elapsed since Joseph Haydn composed his magnificent The Creation oratorio. In all that time, no other musician has given us a better evocation of how the universe began.