Wisdom Quarterly (COMMENTARY)
HEADLINE: "Walking Cactus" Stymies Scientists (story below)
Plants have feelings (sensation). Plants react and respond to their environment -- particularly the emotions of humans and animals to whom they are attached or around, according to astonishing studies presented years ago in The Secret Life of Plants. Now evidence comes forward that "plants" could walk, blurring the line between sentient life forms. They were not wandering vines slithering like snakes but had articulated legs and moved willfully like starfish.
Some rare plants kill animals (e.g., Venus Flytrap), but should we kill vegetables? There is a ridiculous argument that animals do not feel. More ridiculous is the assertion that killing plants to make a vegetarian diet is just as bad as killing animals. It is far worse to kill animals.
But plants should not be killed either, and they do not have to be to eat vegetarian. (Vegetarian does not come from the word "vegetable" but from the Latin word vegetus, which means life; it is a life-giving diet).
Eating "fruit" -- defined broadly as the issue of a plant -- does not take the life of the plant. Seed, sprouts, leaves, bark, even stem may be consumed without "killing." And some plants complete their life cycle and go to seed, so even roots or the entire plant may be harvested.
It is all a degree of sentience, the ability to feel, and the health we expect doing harm to other life forms. Peace (ahimsa) gives rise to health others and oneself.
"Walking Cactus" called missing link for insects
Wynne Parry (LiveScience.com, Feb. 23, 2011)
Plant or animal? The mysterious fossil defies classification. Fossils from an extinct creature, dubbed a "walking cactus," may reveal a piece of arthropod history in their jointed legs.
Fossils of a 10-legged wormy creature that lived 520 million years ago may fill an important gap in the history of the evolution of insects, spiders, and crustaceans.
The so-called walking cactus belongs to a group of extinct worm-like creatures called lobopodians that are thought to have given rise to arthropods. Spiders and other arthropods have segmented bodies and jointed limbs covered in a hardened shell.
Before the discovery of the walking cactus, Diania cactiformis, all lobopodian remains had soft bodies and soft limbs, said Jianni Liu, the lead researcher who is affiliated with Northwest University in China and Freie University in Germany.
"Walking cactus is very important because it is sort of a missing link from lobopodians to arthropods," Liu told LiveScience. "Scientists have always suspected that arthropods evolved from somewhere amongst lobopodians, but until now we didn't have a single fossil you could point at and say that is the first one with jointed legs. And this is what walking cactus shows." [Image of walking cactus fossil] More>>
Plant or animal? The mysterious fossil defies classification. Fossils from an extinct creature, dubbed a "walking cactus," may reveal a piece of arthropod history in their jointed legs.Fossils of a 10-legged wormy creature that lived 520 million years ago may fill an important gap in the history of the evolution of insects, spiders, and crustaceans.
The so-called walking cactus belongs to a group of extinct worm-like creatures called lobopodians that are thought to have given rise to arthropods. Spiders and other arthropods have segmented bodies and jointed limbs covered in a hardened shell.
Before the discovery of the walking cactus, Diania cactiformis, all lobopodian remains had soft bodies and soft limbs, said Jianni Liu, the lead researcher who is affiliated with Northwest University in China and Freie University in Germany.
"Walking cactus is very important because it is sort of a missing link from lobopodians to arthropods," Liu told LiveScience. "Scientists have always suspected that arthropods evolved from somewhere amongst lobopodians, but until now we didn't have a single fossil you could point at and say that is the first one with jointed legs. And this is what walking cactus shows." [Image of walking cactus fossil] More>>
Archaeologists find 11,500-y.o. grave with cremated 3-y.o.
Stephanie Pappas (LiveScience.com, Feb. 25, 2011)
Stephanie Pappas (LiveScience.com, Feb. 25, 2011)
An archaeological dig in Alaska has uncovered the oldest human remains ever found in Arctic or Subarctic North America -- the cremated skeleton of a 3-year-old.
The chlid's burned bone fragments were found in a fire pit in the remains of an ancient house near the Tanana River in central Alaska. Researchers date the cremation to 11,500 years ago. After the child's body was burned, researchers report in the Feb. 25 issue of the journal Science, the house and hearth were buried and abandoned.
"The fact that the child was cremated within the center of the house… this was an important member of society," said study author Ben Potter, an archaeologist at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.
Cooking and cremation
The child's remains aren't the only thing about the find that excites Potter and his colleagues. The Paleoindian inhabitants of Alaska left few structures behind; usually, archaeologists discover outdoor hearths and specialized tools that suggest temporary work sites or hunting camps.
The child's remains aren't the only thing about the find that excites Potter and his colleagues. The Paleoindian inhabitants of Alaska left few structures behind; usually, archaeologists discover outdoor hearths and specialized tools that suggest temporary work sites or hunting camps.
The house that became a child's grave is the first house structure found from this time period in northern North America. The most similar site found is on the Kamchatka Peninsula in far eastern Russia, Potter said during a press conference. More>>
Annoying head of Egyptian antiquities under fire 
(FOX) The political upheaval in Egypt has thrown Egyptian archaeology into a state of uncertainty: Expeditions have been disrupted. Moreover, Zahi Hawass (at left), the head of the country's antiquity council, is now coming under fire from protesters. Known for his flamboyant style -- including an Indiana Jones-style fedora -- and his boosterism of Egypt's treasures, Hawass is the face of Egyptian archaeology. As secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), Hawass is in charge of approving any archaeological research that goes on in Egypt. More>>
