scientificamerican--2020-08-13--Darwin, Expression, and the Lasting Legacy of Eugenics

In 1872 , with the publication of “ The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals , ” Charles Darwin went rogue .
Only a decade after the anatomist Duchenne de Boulogne ’ s produced the first neurology text illustrated by photographs , Darwin claimed to be the first to use photographs in a scientific publication to actually document the expressive spectrum of the face .
Combining speculation about raised eyebrows and flushed skin with vile commentary about mental illness , he famously logged diagrams of facial musculature , along with drawings of sulky chimpanzees and photographs of weeping @ @ @ @ @ @ @ spanned species , temperament , age , and gender .
But what really interested him was not so much the specificity of the individual as the universality of the tribe : If expressions could , as de Boulogne had suggested , be physically localized , could they also be culturally generalized ?
As a man of science , he set out to analyze the visual difference between types , which is to say races .
While Darwin ’ s scientific contributions remain ever significant , it ’ s worth remembering he was also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , affluent , commanding—who generalized as much as , if not more than , he analyzed , especially when it came to objectifying people ’ s looks .
In spite of his influence on evolutionary biology and his role in the scientific study of emotion , Darwin ’ s prognostications read today as remarkably prejudicial .
( “ No determined man , ” he writes in “ The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals , ” “ probably ever had an habitually gaping mouth.
” ) This urge to label “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ essentially go viral in the early years of the coming century , with such assumptions reasserting themselves as dogmatic , even axiomatic , fact .
Hardly the first to postulate on the graphic evidence of the grimace , Darwin hoped to introduce a system by which facial expressions might be properly evaluated .
He shared with many of his generation a predisposition toward history : simply put , the idea that certain facial traits might have a basis in evolution .
Empirically , the idea itself is not unreasonable .
We are , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ traits with those in our familial line , occasionally by virtue of our geographic vicinity .
At the same time , certain specimens , when classified by visual genre , become the easy targets of discrimination .
In so doing , comparisons can—and do—glide effortlessly from hypothesis to hyperbole , particularly when images are in play .
Almost exactly a century after the arrival of Darwin ’ s volume , Paul Ekman , a psychologist at the University of California , published a study in which he determined that there were seven principal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : anger , contempt , fear , happiness , interest , sadness , and surprise .
His Facial Action Coding System ( FACS ) supported many of Darwin ’ s earlier findings and remains , to date , the gold standard for identifying any movement the face can make .
As a methodology for parsing facial expression , Ekman ’ s work provides a practical rubric for understanding these distinctions : It ’ s logical , codified , and clear .
But what happens to such comparative practices when supposition trumps proposition , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the lure of a bigger , messier , more global extrapolation ?
When does the quest for the universal backfire—and become a discriminatory practice ?
The real seduction , in Darwin ’ s era and in our own , lies in the notion that pictures—and especially pictures of our faces—are remarkably powerful tools of persuasion and do , in so many instances , speak louder than words .
The idea that photography allowed for the demonstration and distribution of objective visual evidence was a striking development for clinicians .
Unlike the interpretive @ @ @ @ @ @ @ abstract data of a diagram , the camera was clear and direct , a vehicle for proof .
The process itself allowed for a kind of massive stockpiling—pictures compared to one another , minutiae contrasted , hypotheses often mistakenly corroborated—which , while arguably rooted in scientific inquiry , led to a stunning degree of generalization in the name of fact .
If evolution is seen as the study of unseen development—biological , generational , temporal , and by definition intangible—the camera provided the illusion of quantifiable benchmarks , an irresistible proposition for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s cousin , the noted statistician Francis Galton , saw such generalizations as precisely the point .
Long before computer software would make such computational practice commonplace , he introduced not a lateral but a synthetic system for facial comparison : what he termed “ composite portraiture ” was , in fact , a neologism for pictorial averaging .
Galton ’ s objective was to identify deviation and , in so doing , to reverse-engineer an ideal “ type , ” which he did by repeat printing—upon a single photographic plate and within @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a force-amalgamated portrait of multiple faces .
At once besotted with mechanical certainty and mesmerized by the scope of visual wonder before him , Galton thrilled to the notion of mathematical precision—the lockup on the photographic plate , the reckoning of the binomial curve—but appeared uninterested in actual details unless they could help reaffirm his suppositions about averages , about types , even about the photomechanical process itself .
That Galton drew upon the language of statistical fact—and benefited from the presumed sovereignty of his own exalted social position—to become an evangelist for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but the fact that he viewed his composite photographs as plausible evidence for an unforgiving sociocultural rationale shifts the legacy of his scholarship into far more pernicious territory .
At once driven by claims of biological determinism and supported by the authoritarian heft of British empiricism , Francis Galton pioneered an insidious form of human scrutiny that would come to be known as eugenics .
The word itself comes from the Greek word eugenes ( noble , well-born , and “ good in stock ” ) , though Galton ’ s own definition @ @ @ @ @ @ @ him , it was a science addressing “ all influences that improve the inborn qualities of a race , also with those that develop them to the utmost advantage.
” The idea of social betterment through better breeding ( indeed , the notion of better anything through breeding ) led to a horrifying era of social supremacism in which “ deviation ” would come to be classified across a broad spectrum of race , religion , health , wealth , and every imaginable kind of human infirmity .
Grossly and idiosyncratically defined—even a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was considered a genetically inherited trait—Galton ’ s remarkably flawed ( and deeply racist ) ideology soon found favor with a public eager to assert , if nothing else , its own vile claims to vanity .
The social climate into which eugenic doctrine inserted itself appealed to precisely this fantasy , beginning with “ Better Baby ” and “ Fitter Family ” contests , an unfortunate staple of recreational entertainment that emerged across the regional United States during the early years of the 20th century .
Widely promoted as a wholesome public @ @ @ @ @ @ @ good-looking children for prizes ( a practice that essentially likened kids to livestock ) was one of a number of practices predicated on the notion that better breeding outcomes were in everyone ’ s best interest .
The resulting photos conferred bragging rights on the winning ( read “ white ” ) contestants , but the broader message—framing beauty , but especially facial beauty , as a scientifically sanctioned community aspiration—implicitly suggests that the inverse was also true : that to be found “ unfit ” was to be doomed to social exile @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , by fierce reproductive protocols .
In 29 states—beginning in 1907 and until the laws were repealed in the 1940s—those deemed socially inferior ( an inexcusable euphemism for what was then defined as physically “ inadequate ” ) were , in fact , subject to compulsory sterilization .
From asthma to scoliosis , mental disability to moral delinquency , eugenicists denounced difference in light of a presumed cultural superiority , a skewed imperialism that found its most nefarious expression during the Third Reich .
To measure difference was to eradicate it , exterminate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Though ultimately discredited following the atrocities endured during multiple years of Nazi reign , eugenic theory was steeped in this sinister view of genetic governance , manifest destiny run amok .
Later , once detached from Galton ’ s maniacal gaze , the composite portrait would inspire others to play with the optics of the amalgamated image .
The 19th-century French photographer Arthur Batut , known for being one of the first aerial photographers ( he shot from a kite ) , may have been drawn to the hints of movement generated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
American photographer Nancy Burson has experimented with composite photography to merge black , Asian , and Caucasian faces against population statistics : Introduced in 2000 , her Human Race Machine lets you see how you would look as another race .
The artist Richard Prince flattened every one of Jerry Seinfeld ’ s fifty-seven TV love interests into a 2013 composite he called “ Jerry ’ s Girls , ” while in 2017 , data scientist Giuseppe Sollazzo created a blended face for the BBC that used a carefully plotted algorithm to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Galton would have appreciated the speed of the software and the advantages of the algorithm—but what of the ethics of the very act of image capture and comparison , of the ethics of pictorial appropriation itself ?
There ’ s an implicit generalization to this kind of image production and indeed , seen over time , composite portraiture would become a way to amalgamate and assess an entire culture , even an era .
In a 1931 radio interview , the German portraitist August Sander claimed he wanted to “ capture and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of a whole generation , ” an observation that reframes the composite as a kind of collected census , or population survey .
The camera , after all , bears witness over time , its outcome an extension of the eye , the mind , the soul of the photographer .
Sander was right .
( So was Susan Sontag : “ Humanity , ” she once wrote , “ is not one.
” ) With the advent of better , cheaper , faster , and more mobile technologies for capturing our faces @ @ @ @ @ @ @ generation was about to become a great deal more achievable .
This article first appeared on The MIT Press Reader on August 3 , 2020 .

In 1872, with the publication of “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals,” Charles Darwin went rogue. Only a decade after the anatomist Duchenne de Boulogne’s produced the first neurology text illustrated by photographs, Darwin claimed to be the first to use photographs in a scientific publication to actually document the expressive spectrum of the face.
Combining speculation about raised eyebrows and flushed skin with vile commentary about mental illness, he famously logged diagrams of facial musculature, along with drawings of sulky chimpanzees and photographs of weeping infants, to create a study that spanned species, temperament, age, and gender. But what really interested him was not so much the specificity of the individual as the universality of the tribe: If expressions could, as de Boulogne had suggested, be physically localized, could they also be culturally generalized?
As a man of science, he set out to analyze the visual difference between types, which is to say races. While Darwin’s scientific contributions remain ever significant, it’s worth remembering he was also a man of his era—privileged, white, affluent, commanding—who generalized as much as, if not more than, he analyzed, especially when it came to objectifying people’s looks. In spite of his influence on evolutionary biology and his role in the scientific study of emotion, Darwin’s prognostications read today as remarkably prejudicial. (“No determined man,” he writes in “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals,” “probably ever had an habitually gaping mouth.”) This urge to label “types”—a loaded and unfortunate term—would essentially go viral in the early years of the coming century, with such assumptions reasserting themselves as dogmatic, even axiomatic, fact.
Hardly the first to postulate on the graphic evidence of the grimace, Darwin hoped to introduce a system by which facial expressions might be properly evaluated. He shared with many of his generation a predisposition toward history: simply put, the idea that certain facial traits might have a basis in evolution. Empirically, the idea itself is not unreasonable. We are, after all, genetically predisposed to share traits with those in our familial line, occasionally by virtue of our geographic vicinity. At the same time, certain specimens, when classified by visual genre, become the easy targets of discrimination. In so doing, comparisons can—and do—glide effortlessly from hypothesis to hyperbole, particularly when images are in play.
Almost exactly a century after the arrival of Darwin’s volume, Paul Ekman, a psychologist at the University of California, published a study in which he determined that there were seven principal facial expressions deemed universal across all cultures: anger, contempt, fear, happiness, interest, sadness, and surprise. His Facial Action Coding System (FACS) supported many of Darwin’s earlier findings and remains, to date, the gold standard for identifying any movement the face can make. As a methodology for parsing facial expression, Ekman’s work provides a practical rubric for understanding these distinctions: It’s logical, codified, and clear. But what happens to such comparative practices when supposition trumps proposition, when the science of scrutiny is eclipsed by the lure of a bigger, messier, more global extrapolation? When does the quest for the universal backfire—and become a discriminatory practice?
The real seduction, in Darwin’s era and in our own, lies in the notion that pictures—and especially pictures of our faces—are remarkably powerful tools of persuasion and do, in so many instances, speak louder than words.
The idea that photography allowed for the demonstration and distribution of objective visual evidence was a striking development for clinicians. Unlike the interpretive transference of a drawing, or the abstract data of a diagram, the camera was clear and direct, a vehicle for proof. The process itself allowed for a kind of massive stockpiling—pictures compared to one another, minutiae contrasted, hypotheses often mistakenly corroborated—which, while arguably rooted in scientific inquiry, led to a stunning degree of generalization in the name of fact. If evolution is seen as the study of unseen development—biological, generational, temporal, and by definition intangible—the camera provided the illusion of quantifiable benchmarks, an irresistible proposition for the proponents of theoretical ideas.
Darwin’s cousin, the noted statistician Francis Galton, saw such generalizations as precisely the point. Long before computer software would make such computational practice commonplace, he introduced not a lateral but a synthetic system for facial comparison: what he termed “composite portraiture” was, in fact, a neologism for pictorial averaging. Galton’s objective was to identify deviation and, in so doing, to reverse-engineer an ideal “type,” which he did by repeat printing—upon a single photographic plate and within the same vicinity to one another—thereby creating a force-amalgamated portrait of multiple faces. At once besotted with mechanical certainty and mesmerized by the scope of visual wonder before him, Galton thrilled to the notion of mathematical precision—the lockup on the photographic plate, the reckoning of the binomial curve—but appeared uninterested in actual details unless they could help reaffirm his suppositions about averages, about types, even about the photomechanical process itself.
That Galton drew upon the language of statistical fact—and benefited from the presumed sovereignty of his own exalted social position—to become an evangelist for the camera is questionable in itself, but the fact that he viewed his composite photographs as plausible evidence for an unforgiving sociocultural rationale shifts the legacy of his scholarship into far more pernicious territory.
At once driven by claims of biological determinism and supported by the authoritarian heft of British empiricism, Francis Galton pioneered an insidious form of human scrutiny that would come to be known as eugenics. The word itself comes from the Greek word eugenes (noble, well-born, and “good in stock”), though Galton’s own definition is a bit more sinister: For him, it was a science addressing “all influences that improve the inborn qualities of a race, also with those that develop them to the utmost advantage.” The idea of social betterment through better breeding (indeed, the notion of better anything through breeding) led to a horrifying era of social supremacism in which “deviation” would come to be classified across a broad spectrum of race, religion, health, wealth, and every imaginable kind of human infirmity. Grossly and idiosyncratically defined—even a “propensity” for carpentry or dress-making was considered a genetically inherited trait—Galton’s remarkably flawed (and deeply racist) ideology soon found favor with a public eager to assert, if nothing else, its own vile claims to vanity.
The social climate into which eugenic doctrine inserted itself appealed to precisely this fantasy, beginning with “Better Baby” and “Fitter Family” contests, an unfortunate staple of recreational entertainment that emerged across the regional United States during the early years of the 20th century. Widely promoted as a wholesome public health initiative, the idea of parading good-looking children for prizes (a practice that essentially likened kids to livestock) was one of a number of practices predicated on the notion that better breeding outcomes were in everyone’s best interest. The resulting photos conferred bragging rights on the winning (read “white”) contestants, but the broader message—framing beauty, but especially facial beauty, as a scientifically sanctioned community aspiration—implicitly suggests that the inverse was also true: that to be found “unfit” was to be doomed to social exile and thus restricted, among other things, by fierce reproductive protocols.
In 29 states—beginning in 1907 and until the laws were repealed in the 1940s—those deemed socially inferior (an inexcusable euphemism for what was then defined as physically “inadequate”) were, in fact, subject to compulsory sterilization. From asthma to scoliosis, mental disability to moral delinquency, eugenicists denounced difference in light of a presumed cultural superiority, a skewed imperialism that found its most nefarious expression during the Third Reich. To measure difference was to eradicate it, exterminate it, excise it from evolutionary fact. Though ultimately discredited following the atrocities endured during multiple years of Nazi reign, eugenic theory was steeped in this sinister view of genetic governance, manifest destiny run amok.
Later, once detached from Galton’s maniacal gaze, the composite portrait would inspire others to play with the optics of the amalgamated image. The 19th-century French photographer Arthur Batut, known for being one of the first aerial photographers (he shot from a kite), may have been drawn to the hints of movement generated by a portrait’s animated edges. American photographer Nancy Burson has experimented with composite photography to merge black, Asian, and Caucasian faces against population statistics: Introduced in 2000, her Human Race Machine lets you see how you would look as another race. The artist Richard Prince flattened every one of Jerry Seinfeld’s fifty-seven TV love interests into a 2013 composite he called “Jerry’s Girls,” while in 2017, data scientist Giuseppe Sollazzo created a blended face for the BBC that used a carefully plotted algorithm to combine every face in the U.S. Senate.
Galton would have appreciated the speed of the software and the advantages of the algorithm—but what of the ethics of the very act of image capture and comparison, of the ethics of pictorial appropriation itself? There’s an implicit generalization to this kind of image production and indeed, seen over time, composite portraiture would become a way to amalgamate and assess an entire culture, even an era. In a 1931 radio interview, the German portraitist August Sander claimed he wanted to “capture and communicate in photography the physiognomic time exposure of a whole generation,” an observation that reframes the composite as a kind of collected census, or population survey.
The camera, after all, bears witness over time, its outcome an extension of the eye, the mind, the soul of the photographer. Sander was right. (So was Susan Sontag: “Humanity,” she once wrote, “is not one.”) With the advent of better, cheaper, faster, and more mobile technologies for capturing our faces, the time exposure of a whole generation was about to become a great deal more achievable.
This article first appeared on The MIT Press Reader on August 3, 2020.


scientificamerican--2020-08-13--The 1918 Flu Faded in Our Collective Memory: We Might 'Forget' the Coronavirus, Too

In 1924 Encyclopædia Britannica published a two-volume history of the 20th century thus far .
More than 80 authors—professors and politicians , soldiers and scientists—contributed chapters to These Eventful Years : The Twentieth Century in the Making as Told by Many of Its Makers .
But the book ’ s sprawling 1,300 pages never mention the catastrophic influenza pandemic that had killed between 50 million and 100 million people worldwide only five years earlier .
And many history textbooks in subsequent decades just note the 1918–1919 flu pandemic as an aside when discussing World War I , if at all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had remained strangely faint in the public sphere , compared with other momentous events of the 20th century .
Monuments and federal holidays commemorate people lost in both World Wars .
Many popular museums and blockbuster movies recount the sinking of the Titanic and the Apollo moon missions .
But the same can not be said for the 1918 flu ( often referred to as the “ Spanish flu ” because of mistaken beliefs about its origin ) .
Of course , the pandemic was not forgotten entirely : many today are aware @ @ @ @ @ @ @ who succumbed to it .
But the event seems to form a disproportionately small part of our society ’ s narrative of its past .
That such a devastating pandemic could become so dormant in our collective memory puzzled Guy Beiner , a historian at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel , prompting him to spend decades researching its legacy .
“ We have an illusion .
We believe that if an event is historically significant—if it affects many , many people , if it changes the fate of countries in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it—then it will inevitably be remembered , ” he says .
“ That ’ s not at all how it works .
And the Spanish flu is exactly a warning for that.
” Beiner began collecting books about the 1918 pandemic 20 years ago .
For a long time , they emerged in a very slow trickle .
But now , as the world reckons with COVID-19 , he can hardly keep up with the outpouring of both nonfiction and fiction .
“ I have , in my office , three stacks [ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” he says .
Previously a niche topic even among historians , the 1918 flu has been compared to the current pandemic in terms of the fatality rate , apparent effectiveness of masks and social distancing , and potential economic impact .
In March 2020 alone , the English-language Wikipedia page for “ Spanish flu ” garnered more than 8.2 million views , shattering the pre-2020 monthly record of 144,000 views during the pandemic ’ s 2018 centennial .
The worldwide “ forgetting ” and ongoing rediscovery of the 1918 flu provide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ memory .
And they offer tantalizing clues about how future generations might regard the current coronavirus pandemic .
Pioneered in the early 20th century by sociologist Maurice Halbwachs , the study of collective memory has garnered widespread interest across the social sciences in recent years .
Henry Roediger III , a psychologist at Washington University in St. Louis , defines collective memory as “ how we remember ourselves as part of a group ... that forms our identity.
” Groups such as nations , political parties , religious communities and sports fandoms , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ collective past into a narrative that reinforces individual members ’ shared sense of who they are .
Researchers often use open-recall methods to study groups ’ collective memory of well-known historical events .
For example , Roediger and his colleague James Wertsch , also at Washington University in St. Louis , asked Americans and Russians to name the 10 most important events of World War II .
Americans most often cited the attack on Pearl Harbor , the atomic bombings of Japan and the Holocaust .
Most Russians highlighted the Battle of Stalingrad @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Siege of Leningrad .
The only event that appeared on both lists was D-Day , known in Russia as “ the opening of the second front.
” The events most strongly recalled by people in each country , the researchers say , reflect that nation ’ s narrative framework , or schema , for remembering the past .
Such a study could indicate what specifics about the 1918 flu people are aware of .
But “ as far as I know , nobody ’ s done it , ” Wertsch says .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would come up with nothing.
” Even in making comparisons with COVID-19 , he says , few individuals can cite significant details about the earlier pandemic .
Wertsch notes that collective memory seems to depend largely on narratives with a clear beginning , middle and end .
“ If there ’ s one cognitive instrument that is the most ubiquitous , most natural ... , it ’ s narrative , ” he says .
“ Not all human cultures have arithmetic number systems , let alone calculus .
But all human cultures use @ @ @ @ @ @ @ World War I , the global conflict provided a clear narrative arc , replete with heroes and villains , victories and defeats .
From this standpoint , an invisible enemy such as the 1918 flu made little narrative sense .
It had no clear origin , killed otherwise healthy people in multiple waves and slinked away without being understood .
Scientists at the time did not even know that a virus , not a bacterium , caused the flu .
“ The doctors had shame , ” Beiner says .
“ It was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Without a narrative schema to anchor it , the pandemic all but vanished from public discourse soon after it ended .
Unlike the 1918 flu , so far COVID-19 has no massive war with which to compete in memory .
And science ’ s understanding of viruses has dramatically improved in the past century ( although many COVID-19 mysteries remain ) .
Yet , in some ways , not much has changed since our ancestors ’ pandemic .
“ Even if our experiment in lockdown , in its sheer scale and strictness , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the same way as they were ” more than 100 years ago , says Laura Spinney , author of Pale Rider : The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World .
“ Until we have a vaccine , our main way of protecting ourselves is social distancing , and that was their main way of protecting themselves then.
” The current controversy about masks has a precedent , too : for instance , nearly 2,000 people attended a 1919 meeting of the Anti-Mask League of San Francisco .
Research @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of collective memories is scant .
Roediger and Wertsch suspect that divisiveness does increase the salience of an individual ’ s recollection of an event .
But Wertsch questions this effect ’ s potential influence on a cohesive collective memory of the current pandemic .
“ The virus is just not an ideal character for an ideal narrative , ” he says .
Even the race to develop and distribute a vaccine is unlikely to yield a strong narrative , according to Wertsch .
“ It ’ s conceivable that we might see @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the 19th century , ” he says .
“ But it ’ s noteworthy that our memory of him is precisely of him and not any particular ... epidemic.
” Still , with or without a strong story , COVID-19 will be much better documented than the pandemic that occurred 100 years ago .
Could exhaustive media coverage strengthen a collective memory ?
While the 1918 flu raged , newspapers and magazines did cover it extensively .
Meg Spratt , a lecturer in communication at the University of Washington , notes that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ featured “ biomilitaristic ” language .
Many articles framed the situation as a battle between humans ( mainly government officials ) and the disease .
But the press of the day published “ very little on the experience of the victims and survivors themselves , ” Spratt says .
Instead coverage emphasized experts and authority—almost exclusively white men .
Spratt also saw evidence that World War I overshadowed the disease .
“ When influenza deaths surpassed war deaths in Fall of 1918 , The New York Times ran the news as a small @ @ @ @ @ @ @ she wrote in a 2001 paper on the topic .
Spratt perceives certain parallels between the coverage of the 1918 flu and that of COVID-19 .
“ You still have this emphasis on the public health experts trying to come up with some sort of policies or recommendations to protect people , ” she says .
“ But today there seems to be this amplification .
I think that comes partly from the different media technology we have.
” Since the Internet and social media have enabled ordinary citizens to publicly document their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , “ there ’ s going to be richer material about what people actually went through.
” In this way , from firsthand accounts of essential workers to reports on racial and socioeconomic disparities in COVID-19 ’ s impacts , the media landscape of 2020 is providing a more complete picture of the current pandemic .
Photographs , too , could help to build a collective memory of COVID-19 .
Psychological research has consistently shown that humans ’ visual memory is much stronger than our recollection of words or abstract ideas .
Thus @ @ @ @ @ @ @ backbone of a collective memory , Roediger says .
History is filled with such iconic imagery : American troops raising the flag on Iwo Jima ; the Twin Towers collapsing on 9/11 ; Colin Kaepernick kneeling during the national anthem .
But “ the cameras tend to stop at the door of the sick room or of the hospital , ” Spinney notes .
“ We tend to not go into that space.
” Few images show the dramatic symptoms , such as a blue face and bleeding from the ears , suffered @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Similarly , striking photographs that could reinforce collective memory are scarce in today ’ s news reports of hospitals running over capacity , shortages of personal protective equipment and high death tolls in nursing homes .
Even if no iconic images emerge , though , individuals will certainly remember how COVID-19 affected them and their families .
The same was true for the 1918 flu : in 1974 historian Richard Collier published a book compiling the personal recollections of more than 1,700 people from around the world .
But as historians have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ according to the social context of the time .
This year is not the first time a new pandemic has prompted reexamination of the one in 1918 .
The 20th century saw two more flu pandemics , which occurred in 1957 and 1968 .
In both cases , “ suddenly the memory of the Great Flu reoccurs , ” Beiner says .
“ People begin looking for this precedent ; people begin looking for the cure.
” Likewise , during the avian flu scare in 2005 and the swine flu pandemic in 2009 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ flu ” spiked ( though both increases were dwarfed by the one that occurred this past March ) .
All the while a growing body of historical research has been fleshing out the story of the 1918 flu , providing the foundation for a significant resurgence of its memory in the public sphere .
Beiner sees the current crisis as a tipping point in how society will remember the 1918 pandemic .
Among his collection of books about it , he says , “ none of them became the big novel , a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ think this might change now.
” Beiner predicts COVID-19 will inspire a best-selling novel or major film centered on the flu of 1918 .
This type of cultural landmark could serve as an anchor for public discourse about the event , fortifying the present wave of social remembering .
As for COVID-19 , Beiner anticipates similar “ surges in memory and then lapses in memory ” over the coming decades .
“ We ’ re going to have a complicated story .
And it ’ s going to always be a dialectic , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the public sphere and what ’ s relegated to the private sphere , ” he says .
A stronger collective memory of the 1918 flu could also help create the narrative schema necessary to maintain COVID-19 ’ s public profile after today ’ s pandemic ends .
If monuments , museums or commemorations are established , they , too , would provide a social framework for continuing discussion of the current crisis .
In fact , the New-York Historical Society is already collecting items related to COVID-19 for a future exhibit .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ more impact this time because now we are aware that we didn ’ t remember , in a public way , the Spanish flu of 1918 , ” says José Sobral , a social anthropologist at the University of Lisbon .
Wertsch is not so sure .
“ In a matter of a few years , ” he says , “ we might forget this.
” He suspects that how the coronavirus pandemic ends—and whether it is followed by other pandemics—will determine whether nations can weave a narrative about COVID-19 as part of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s only by knowing the end , ” Wertsch says , “ that we know the meaning of the beginning and the middle.
” Do you have ancestors who were affected by the 1918 pandemic ?
If so , we ’ d like to hear from you to keep the memory alive .
Send a message to the editors at editors @ sciam.com telling the story of those ancestors—or let us know how COVID-19 has impacted your life .
Read more about the coronavirus outbreak from Scientific American here .
And read coverage @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

In 1924 Encyclopædia Britannica published a two-volume history of the 20th century thus far. More than 80 authors—professors and politicians, soldiers and scientists—contributed chapters to These Eventful Years: The Twentieth Century in the Making as Told by Many of Its Makers. But the book’s sprawling 1,300 pages never mention the catastrophic influenza pandemic that had killed between 50 million and 100 million people worldwide only five years earlier. And many history textbooks in subsequent decades just note the 1918–1919 flu pandemic as an aside when discussing World War I, if at all.
Until quite recently, the pandemic had remained strangely faint in the public sphere, compared with other momentous events of the 20th century. Monuments and federal holidays commemorate people lost in both World Wars. Many popular museums and blockbuster movies recount the sinking of the Titanic and the Apollo moon missions. But the same cannot be said for the 1918 flu (often referred to as the “Spanish flu” because of mistaken beliefs about its origin). Of course, the pandemic was not forgotten entirely: many today are aware it occurred or even know of ancestors who succumbed to it. But the event seems to form a disproportionately small part of our society’s narrative of its past.
That such a devastating pandemic could become so dormant in our collective memory puzzled Guy Beiner, a historian at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, prompting him to spend decades researching its legacy. “We have an illusion. We believe that if an event is historically significant—if it affects many, many people, if it changes the fate of countries in the world, if many people die from it—then it will inevitably be remembered,” he says. “That’s not at all how it works. And the Spanish flu is exactly a warning for that.”
Beiner began collecting books about the 1918 pandemic 20 years ago. For a long time, they emerged in a very slow trickle. But now, as the world reckons with COVID-19, he can hardly keep up with the outpouring of both nonfiction and fiction. “I have, in my office, three stacks [of novels] waiting for me—huge stacks,” he says. Previously a niche topic even among historians, the 1918 flu has been compared to the current pandemic in terms of the fatality rate, apparent effectiveness of masks and social distancing, and potential economic impact. In March 2020 alone, the English-language Wikipedia page for “Spanish flu” garnered more than 8.2 million views, shattering the pre-2020 monthly record of 144,000 views during the pandemic’s 2018 centennial.
The worldwide “forgetting” and ongoing rediscovery of the 1918 flu provide a window into the science of collective memory. And they offer tantalizing clues about how future generations might regard the current coronavirus pandemic.
What Is Collective Memory?
Pioneered in the early 20th century by sociologist Maurice Halbwachs, the study of collective memory has garnered widespread interest across the social sciences in recent years. Henry Roediger III, a psychologist at Washington University in St. Louis, defines collective memory as “how we remember ourselves as part of a group ... that forms our identity.” Groups such as nations, political parties, religious communities and sports fandoms, he explains, weave events from their collective past into a narrative that reinforces individual members’ shared sense of who they are.
Researchers often use open-recall methods to study groups’ collective memory of well-known historical events. For example, Roediger and his colleague James Wertsch, also at Washington University in St. Louis, asked Americans and Russians to name the 10 most important events of World War II. Americans most often cited the attack on Pearl Harbor, the atomic bombings of Japan and the Holocaust. Most Russians highlighted the Battle of Stalingrad, the Battle of Kursk and the Siege of Leningrad. The only event that appeared on both lists was D-Day, known in Russia as “the opening of the second front.” The events most strongly recalled by people in each country, the researchers say, reflect that nation’s narrative framework, or schema, for remembering the past.
Seattle policemen wearing protective gauze face masks during the influenza epidemic of 1918. Credit: Time Life Pictures, National Archives and The LIFE Picture Collection Getty Images
Such a study could indicate what specifics about the 1918 flu people are aware of. But “as far as I know, nobody’s done it,” Wertsch says. “If you did a survey, you would come up with nothing.” Even in making comparisons with COVID-19, he says, few individuals can cite significant details about the earlier pandemic. Wertsch notes that collective memory seems to depend largely on narratives with a clear beginning, middle and end. “If there’s one cognitive instrument that is the most ubiquitous, most natural..., it’s narrative,” he says. “Not all human cultures have arithmetic number systems, let alone calculus. But all human cultures use narratives.”
For the countries engaged in World War I, the global conflict provided a clear narrative arc, replete with heroes and villains, victories and defeats. From this standpoint, an invisible enemy such as the 1918 flu made little narrative sense. It had no clear origin, killed otherwise healthy people in multiple waves and slinked away without being understood. Scientists at the time did not even know that a virus, not a bacterium, caused the flu. “The doctors had shame,” Beiner says. “It was a huge failure of modern medicine.” Without a narrative schema to anchor it, the pandemic all but vanished from public discourse soon after it ended.
Unlike the 1918 flu, so far COVID-19 has no massive war with which to compete in memory. And science’s understanding of viruses has dramatically improved in the past century (although many COVID-19 mysteries remain). Yet, in some ways, not much has changed since our ancestors’ pandemic. “Even if our experiment in lockdown, in its sheer scale and strictness, is unprecedented, we’re thinking in the same way as they were” more than 100 years ago, says Laura Spinney, author of Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World. “Until we have a vaccine, our main way of protecting ourselves is social distancing, and that was their main way of protecting themselves then.” The current controversy about masks has a precedent, too: for instance, nearly 2,000 people attended a 1919 meeting of the Anti-Mask League of San Francisco.
Research on how political polarization affects the formation of collective memories is scant. Roediger and Wertsch suspect that divisiveness does increase the salience of an individual’s recollection of an event. But Wertsch questions this effect’s potential influence on a cohesive collective memory of the current pandemic. “The virus is just not an ideal character for an ideal narrative,” he says.
Even the race to develop and distribute a vaccine is unlikely to yield a strong narrative, according to Wertsch. “It’s conceivable that we might see a hero scientist emerge like Louis Pasteur in the 19th century,” he says. “But it’s noteworthy that our memory of him is precisely of him and not any particular ... epidemic.” Still, with or without a strong story, COVID-19 will be much better documented than the pandemic that occurred 100 years ago. Could exhaustive media coverage strengthen a collective memory?
Media and Imagery
While the 1918 flu raged, newspapers and magazines did cover it extensively. Meg Spratt, a lecturer in communication at the University of Washington, notes that American press coverage of the pandemic prominently featured “biomilitaristic” language. Many articles framed the situation as a battle between humans (mainly government officials) and the disease. But the press of the day published “very little on the experience of the victims and survivors themselves,” Spratt says. Instead coverage emphasized experts and authority—almost exclusively white men. Spratt also saw evidence that World War I overshadowed the disease. “When influenza deaths surpassed war deaths in Fall of 1918, The New York Times ran the news as a small story on an inside page,” she wrote in a 2001 paper on the topic.
Spratt perceives certain parallels between the coverage of the 1918 flu and that of COVID-19. “You still have this emphasis on the public health experts trying to come up with some sort of policies or recommendations to protect people,” she says. “But today there seems to be this amplification. I think that comes partly from the different media technology we have.” Since the Internet and social media have enabled ordinary citizens to publicly document their lives during the pandemic, Spratt says, “there’s going to be richer material about what people actually went through.” In this way, from firsthand accounts of essential workers to reports on racial and socioeconomic disparities in COVID-19’s impacts, the media landscape of 2020 is providing a more complete picture of the current pandemic.
Photographs, too, could help to build a collective memory of COVID-19. Psychological research has consistently shown that humans’ visual memory is much stronger than our recollection of words or abstract ideas. Thus, widely distributed images can form the backbone of a collective memory, Roediger says. History is filled with such iconic imagery: American troops raising the flag on Iwo Jima; the Twin Towers collapsing on 9/11; Colin Kaepernick kneeling during the national anthem. But “the cameras tend to stop at the door of the sick room or of the hospital,” Spinney notes. “We tend to not go into that space.” Few images show the dramatic symptoms, such as a blue face and bleeding from the ears, suffered by many who contracted the 1918 flu. Similarly, striking photographs that could reinforce collective memory are scarce in today’s news reports of hospitals running over capacity, shortages of personal protective equipment and high death tolls in nursing homes.
Even if no iconic images emerge, though, individuals will certainly remember how COVID-19 affected them and their families. The same was true for the 1918 flu: in 1974 historian Richard Collier published a book compiling the personal recollections of more than 1,700 people from around the world. But as historians have discovered, collective memories ebb and flow according to the social context of the time.
Cycles of Remembering and Forgetting
This year is not the first time a new pandemic has prompted reexamination of the one in 1918. The 20th century saw two more flu pandemics, which occurred in 1957 and 1968. In both cases, “suddenly the memory of the Great Flu reoccurs,” Beiner says. “People begin looking for this precedent; people begin looking for the cure.” Likewise, during the avian flu scare in 2005 and the swine flu pandemic in 2009, Google searches worldwide for “Spanish flu” spiked (though both increases were dwarfed by the one that occurred this past March). All the while a growing body of historical research has been fleshing out the story of the 1918 flu, providing the foundation for a significant resurgence of its memory in the public sphere.
Beiner sees the current crisis as a tipping point in how society will remember the 1918 pandemic. Among his collection of books about it, he says, “none of them became the big novel, a book which everybody is reading. I think this might change now.” Beiner predicts COVID-19 will inspire a best-selling novel or major film centered on the flu of 1918. This type of cultural landmark could serve as an anchor for public discourse about the event, fortifying the present wave of social remembering.
As for COVID-19, Beiner anticipates similar “surges in memory and then lapses in memory” over the coming decades. “We’re going to have a complicated story. And it’s going to always be a dialectic, dynamic forgetting and remembering working together—what happens in the public sphere and what’s relegated to the private sphere,” he says.
A stronger collective memory of the 1918 flu could also help create the narrative schema necessary to maintain COVID-19’s public profile after today’s pandemic ends. If monuments, museums or commemorations are established, they, too, would provide a social framework for continuing discussion of the current crisis. In fact, the New-York Historical Society is already collecting items related to COVID-19 for a future exhibit. “I think there will be much more impact this time because now we are aware that we didn’t remember, in a public way, the Spanish flu of 1918,” says José Sobral, a social anthropologist at the University of Lisbon.
Wertsch is not so sure. “In a matter of a few years,” he says, “we might forget this.” He suspects that how the coronavirus pandemic ends—and whether it is followed by other pandemics—will determine whether nations can weave a narrative about COVID-19 as part of a collective memory. “It’s only by knowing the end,” Wertsch says, “that we know the meaning of the beginning and the middle.”
A version of this article with the title “The Pandemic We Forgot” was adapted for inclusion in the November 2020 issue of Scientific American.
Do you have ancestors who were affected by the 1918 pandemic? If so, we’d like to hear from you to keep the memory alive. Send a message to the editors at editors@sciam.com telling the story of those ancestors—or let us know how COVID-19 has impacted your life.
Read more about the coronavirus outbreak from Scientific American here. And read coverage from our international network of magazines here.


scientificamerican--2020-08-13--The Coming or Possibly Nearly Here Storm

Former Scientific American editor Mark Alpert talks about his latest sci-fi thriller The Coming Storm , which warns about the @ @ @ @ @ and of ignoring the scientific findings you do n't like .

Steve Mirsky was the winner of a Twist contest in 1962, for which he received three crayons and three pieces of construction paper. It remains his most prestigious award. Follow Steve Mirsky on Twitter Credit: Nick Higgins


scientificamerican--2020-08-13--Disaster Program Allocates Unprecedented Funds for Climate Resilience

The Federal Emergency Management Agency will reward states and communities that seek to address the effects of climate change under a new grant program that provides an unprecedented amount of money for resilience projects and planning .
FEMA announced last week that it will allocate $ 500 million next year through its Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program for mitigation efforts such as moving buildings out of floodplains and strengthening building codes .
`` It 's a huge increase of resources that FEMA has never had available to it before , '' said Rob Moore of the Natural Resources Defense @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by its acronym BRIC , replaces FEMA 's 23-year-old Pre-Disaster Mitigation Grant Program , which has allocated an average of $ 100 million a year since 2003 .
BRIC places an emphasis on addressing the effects of climate change ; strengthening building codes ; and using natural barriers such as wetlands , floodplains and reefs to build resilience to riverine flooding and sea-level rise .
The pre-disaster mitigation funding fell well short of the demand from states .
Between 2003 and 2016 , the program allocated $ 1.1 billion to states but received @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , according to a FEMA report .
In the final years of the Obama administration , the program provided just $ 25 million a year .
Annual funding in recent years increased to $ 250 million .
The additional money under BRIC comes as climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of hurricanes , floods and wildfires , resulting in a growing number of major disasters in the United States .
`` I ca n't think of another program right now that 's putting up this much money to do mitigation , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Muccio , director of mitigation at Hagerty Consulting Inc. , an emergency management company .
`` I 'm hoping that every year they 're able to make an investment of this size , and as BRIC becomes more heavily funded , the overall spending on federal disasters goes down . ''
FEMA will allocate $ 446 million of the $ 500 million through a competitive process that evaluates funding proposals from states and municipalities on a variety of factors .
The remaining $ 54 million will go to states , territories and American @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up to $ 600,000 .
In evaluating state and municipal discretionary funding requests , FEMA will score each proposal on 14 factors that rate the potential effectiveness of a project and the applicant 's previous work on resilience .
In a major shift from the old disaster mitigation program , FEMA will award points to projects that `` anticipate future conditions '' such as `` climate changes , sea-level rise , '' and changes in population and demographics .
The old program was silent on climate change .
`` There 's much more @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of NRDC said .
`` A lot of things are getting renewed emphasis . ''
The BRIC program makes other changes from its predecessor : • FEMA will award points to projects that use `` nature-based solutions '' — a concept that environmental groups have pushed for flood control as an alternative to levees and dikes .
`` Their point is to get away from gray infrastructure and to try to build some green infrastructure so you 're not just surrounded by flood walls , '' said Muccio of Hagerty Consulting .
• @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have adopted up-to-date construction codes , which require new buildings to be more resilient to damage from strong winds and flooding .
FEMA has been urging states and municipalities to update their building codes , and has noted critically that many states continue to use outdated codes .
• FEMA will provide individual grants up to $ 50 million — an increase from the previous $ 10 million limit , which some local officials said was inadequate to fund major projects that could substantially reduce a community 's exposure to natural disasters .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ be done on the coastline , and they 're expensive , '' Muccio said .
The BRIC program was authorized under a major federal disaster law enacted in October 2018 that aimed , among other things , to provide more federal money for mitigation and resilience projects .
The new law provides a steady stream of funding for the BRIC program by allowing FEMA to set aside for the program a small percentage of the money it spends on disaster recovery each year .
The old Pre-Disaster Mitigation Grant Program had no guaranteed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ money as Congress and the White House approved each year .
The sums fluctuated year to year .
`` BRIC is not only a substantial increase in dollars that FEMA can distribute to state and local government , it also represents a stability of funding that has never existed , '' Moore said .
`` The old program has been on a yo-yo budgetwise since its inception . ''
Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from E & E News .
E & E provides daily coverage of essential energy and environmental news at @ @

The Federal Emergency Management Agency will reward states and communities that seek to address the effects of climate change under a new grant program that provides an unprecedented amount of money for resilience projects and planning.
FEMA announced last week that it will allocate $500 million next year through its Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program for mitigation efforts such as moving buildings out of floodplains and strengthening building codes.
"It's a huge increase of resources that FEMA has never had available to it before," said Rob Moore of the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The new program, known by its acronym BRIC, replaces FEMA's 23-year-old Pre-Disaster Mitigation Grant Program, which has allocated an average of $100 million a year since 2003.
BRIC places an emphasis on addressing the effects of climate change; strengthening building codes; and using natural barriers such as wetlands, floodplains and reefs to build resilience to riverine flooding and sea-level rise.
The pre-disaster mitigation funding fell well short of the demand from states. Between 2003 and 2016, the program allocated $1.1 billion to states but received requests for projects totaling $3.2 billion, according to a FEMA report.
In the final years of the Obama administration, the program provided just $25 million a year. Annual funding in recent years increased to $250 million.
The additional money under BRIC comes as climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of hurricanes, floods and wildfires, resulting in a growing number of major disasters in the United States.
"I can't think of another program right now that's putting up this much money to do mitigation, infrastructure and resiliency," said Amelia Muccio, director of mitigation at Hagerty Consulting Inc., an emergency management company. "I'm hoping that every year they're able to make an investment of this size, and as BRIC becomes more heavily funded, the overall spending on federal disasters goes down."
FEMA will allocate $446 million of the $500 million through a competitive process that evaluates funding proposals from states and municipalities on a variety of factors. The remaining $54 million will go to states, territories and American Indian tribes, with each entity receiving up to $600,000.
In evaluating state and municipal discretionary funding requests, FEMA will score each proposal on 14 factors that rate the potential effectiveness of a project and the applicant's previous work on resilience.
In a major shift from the old disaster mitigation program, FEMA will award points to projects that "anticipate future conditions" such as "climate changes, sea-level rise," and changes in population and demographics. The old program was silent on climate change.
"There's much more recognition of climate risks," Moore of NRDC said. "A lot of things are getting renewed emphasis."
The BRIC program makes other changes from its predecessor:
FEMA will award points to projects that use "nature-based solutions" — a concept that environmental groups have pushed for flood control as an alternative to levees and dikes. "Their point is to get away from gray infrastructure and to try to build some green infrastructure so you're not just surrounded by flood walls," said Muccio of Hagerty Consulting.
FEMA will award points to applicants that have adopted up-to-date construction codes, which require new buildings to be more resilient to damage from strong winds and flooding. FEMA has been urging states and municipalities to update their building codes, and has noted critically that many states continue to use outdated codes.
FEMA will provide individual grants up to $50 million — an increase from the previous $10 million limit, which some local officials said was inadequate to fund major projects that could substantially reduce a community's exposure to natural disasters.
"A lot of projects need to be done on the coastline, and they're expensive," Muccio said.
The BRIC program was authorized under a major federal disaster law enacted in October 2018 that aimed, among other things, to provide more federal money for mitigation and resilience projects.
The new law provides a steady stream of funding for the BRIC program by allowing FEMA to set aside for the program a small percentage of the money it spends on disaster recovery each year.
The old Pre-Disaster Mitigation Grant Program had no guaranteed funding source and allocated only as much money as Congress and the White House approved each year. The sums fluctuated year to year.
"BRIC is not only a substantial increase in dollars that FEMA can distribute to state and local government, it also represents a stability of funding that has never existed," Moore said. "The old program has been on a yo-yo budgetwise since its inception."
Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from E&E News. E&E provides daily coverage of essential energy and environmental news at www.eenews.net.


scientificamerican--2020-08-13--A 429-Million-Year-Old Trilobite Had Eyes like Those of Modern Bees

Perfectly pristine fossils might make great museum showpieces , but they are not always the most informative for paleontologists .
Some of the more salient secrets of ancient life are locked inside fossils , and lucky breaks can reveal internal details that may otherwise remain hidden .
In the case of one particular 429-million-year-old trilobite—an extinct arthropod that looked like a big version of a wood louse—a crack in just the right place has allowed paleontologists to see the world through the creature ’ s eyes .
Trilobites are one of evolution ’ s greatest success stories .
These early @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lobes ” of their exoskeletal body , first appeared about 521 million years ago , during the biodiversity spike called the Cambrian explosion .
They proliferated for millions of years more , ranging from sizes smaller than a button to bigger than a dinner plate , before going extinct about 252 million years ago .
And given how common trilobites were in ancient seas , studying their evolutionary history can offer deep insights into life in our planet ’ s oceans .
“ I always liked these nice Aulacopleura trilobites , with their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ says paleontologist Brigitte Schoenemann of the University of Cologne in Germany .
“ And so I bought one.
” Perhaps the fossil would have just been a collector ’ s item for someone else .
But as an expert on the evolution of vision , Schoenemann noticed something unusual about it .
“ I was very surprised to see that one eye was broken , ” she says .
The exposed inner surface revealed the animal ’ s lens , its receptor cells and other parts of its anatomy .
Such detail is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ preservation of delicate cellular structures , especially in the eyes , often relies on rapid burial in oxygen-depleted environments .
Places where this kind of preservation occurs , such as the famous Cambrian Burgess Shale in British Columbia , are few and far between .
( The circumstances in which Schoenemann ’ s Aulacopleura specimen was buried are unclear . )
“ For a long time , it was thought that just bones , teeth and other hard objects could be preserved in the fossil record , ” she says .
“ To @ @ @ @ @ @ @ especially in the eyes , is very , very rare and exceptional.
” Schoenemann and her co-author Euan Clarkson of the University of Edinburgh in Scotland published their analysis of the ancient eye on Thursday in Scientific Reports .
Despite being 429 million years old , the trilobite has a modern-looking eye that resembles those of today ’ s bees and dragonflies .
This type is called an apposition compound eye , meaning each lens acts independently to create a mosaic image of what a creature sees .
The detailed look at the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ evolution of eyes and vision in arthropods over time , says University of New England paleontologist John Paterson , who was not involved in the new study .
“ The take-home message appears to be that trilobites had developed apposition compound eyes during the earliest evolutionary stages of the group and stuck with this design throughout their history.
” Drawing from previous studies of trilobite vision , the paper also offers a window into the type of habitat Aulacopleura preferred .
The eye ’ s anatomy indicates the trilobite lived in a bright @ @ @ @ @ @ @ between lens size and light availability dictated by physics , Schoenemann says , Aulacopleura ’ s small lenses would have functioned best in bright habitats .
Thus , the animal was most likely active during the day .
The trilobite ’ s eye is very different from our own , Schoenemann notes , because it is made up of dozens of facets that would have created a mosaic image of the creature ’ s environment .
“ The eye has about 200 facets and surely is good enough to distinguish obstacles , dark @ @ @ @ @ @ @ shelters , shapes and other organisms , ” she says—adding that the detected organisms would include the predatory cephalopods that probably munched on trilobites at the time .
As Aulacopleura wandered around the ancient shallows , it certainly kept an eye out .

Perfectly pristine fossils might make great museum showpieces, but they are not always the most informative for paleontologists. Some of the more salient secrets of ancient life are locked inside fossils, and lucky breaks can reveal internal details that may otherwise remain hidden. In the case of one particular 429-million-year-old trilobite—an extinct arthropod that looked like a big version of a wood louse—a crack in just the right place has allowed paleontologists to see the world through the creature’s eyes.
Trilobites are one of evolution’s greatest success stories. These early animals, characterized by the “three lobes” of their exoskeletal body, first appeared about 521 million years ago, during the biodiversity spike called the Cambrian explosion. They proliferated for millions of years more, ranging from sizes smaller than a button to bigger than a dinner plate, before going extinct about 252 million years ago. And given how common trilobites were in ancient seas, studying their evolutionary history can offer deep insights into life in our planet’s oceans.
“I always liked these nice Aulacopleura trilobites, with their big heads and big eyes,” says paleontologist Brigitte Schoenemann of the University of Cologne in Germany. “And so I bought one.” Perhaps the fossil would have just been a collector’s item for someone else. But as an expert on the evolution of vision, Schoenemann noticed something unusual about it.
“I was very surprised to see that one eye was broken,” she says. The exposed inner surface revealed the animal’s lens, its receptor cells and other parts of its anatomy. Such detail is uncommon in the fossil record: the preservation of delicate cellular structures, especially in the eyes, often relies on rapid burial in oxygen-depleted environments. Places where this kind of preservation occurs, such as the famous Cambrian Burgess Shale in British Columbia, are few and far between. (The circumstances in which Schoenemann’s Aulacopleura specimen was buried are unclear.)
Outer view of the trilobite Aulacopleura koninckii’s left eye. Credit: Brigitte Schoenemann
“For a long time, it was thought that just bones, teeth and other hard objects could be preserved in the fossil record,” she says. “To be able to distinguish cellular structures, especially in the eyes, is very, very rare and exceptional.”
Schoenemann and her co-author Euan Clarkson of the University of Edinburgh in Scotland published their analysis of the ancient eye on Thursday in Scientific Reports. Despite being 429 million years old, the trilobite has a modern-looking eye that resembles those of today’s bees and dragonflies. This type is called an apposition compound eye, meaning each lens acts independently to create a mosaic image of what a creature sees.
The detailed look at the trilobite’s eye helps track the evolution of eyes and vision in arthropods over time, says University of New England paleontologist John Paterson, who was not involved in the new study. “The take-home message appears to be that trilobites had developed apposition compound eyes during the earliest evolutionary stages of the group and stuck with this design throughout their history.”
Drawing from previous studies of trilobite vision, the paper also offers a window into the type of habitat Aulacopleura preferred. The eye’s anatomy indicates the trilobite lived in a bright, shallow-water environment. Given the relationship between lens size and light availability dictated by physics, Schoenemann says, Aulacopleura’s small lenses would have functioned best in bright habitats. Thus, the animal was most likely active during the day.
The trilobite’s eye is very different from our own, Schoenemann notes, because it is made up of dozens of facets that would have created a mosaic image of the creature’s environment. “The eye has about 200 facets and surely is good enough to distinguish obstacles, dark and bright zones in the environment, shelters, shapes and other organisms,” she says—adding that the detected organisms would include the predatory cephalopods that probably munched on trilobites at the time. As Aulacopleura wandered around the ancient shallows, it certainly kept an eye out.


scientificamerican--2020-08-13--Darwin, Expression and the Lasting Legacy of Eugenics


scientificamerican--2020-08-13--Why Lava Worlds Shine Brightly (It's Not the Lava)

Here on Earth , your best bet for seeing lava is to go to a volcano .
But out in space , there are entire exoplanets made of the stuff .
These so-called lava worlds orbit so close to their stars that their surface temperatures can melt rock—which might sound familiar , says space technologist Mihkel Pajusalu of the University of Tartu in Estonia .
“ For example , from science fiction , we know , from Stars Wars : Episode III , Mustafar planet ... ” Kinda like that but , you know , without the light sabers .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ real lava worlds were extraordinarily bright and reflective .
But why ?
“ There was the idea that maybe it comes from the fact lava itself is basically a liquid , and a smooth surface can reflect light .
Like the surface of water , for example.
” So Pajusalu and his colleagues did what anyone would do to test that idea : they made their own lava .
Here ’ s M.I.T.
’ s Zahra Essack , who led the team .
“ When we removed the lava from the furnace , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over you .
Even from six feet away , it felt like you were standing right on the edge of a roaring bonfire .
The crucible , which was the container holding the lava , was glowing so brightly , it made my eyes water .
It was an incredible experience.
” After producing the lava , the researchers calculated its reflectivity in both the molten and solid states .
And they realized that lava wasn ’ t reflective enough to explain these bright exoplanets they were seeing .
Instead , Essack says @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in yet another way .
“ We think that lava planets could have exotic reflective atmospheres consisting of silica , which is the main component of rocks , and metals like sodium and potassium that could reflect starlight and make the planets appear very bright.
” The work appears in the Astrophysical Journal .
[ Zahra Essack et al.
, Low-albedo surfaces of lava worlds ] If lava worlds feel very far away , and perhaps irrelevant , Essack brought up the fact that Earth was once covered in sloshing lava early in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ around distant stars , we might better understand the history of our own .
[ The above text is a transcript of this podcast . ]

Full Transcript
Here on Earth, your best bet for seeing lava is to go to a volcano. But out in space, there are entire exoplanets made of the stuff. These so-called lava worlds orbit so close to their stars that their surface temperatures can melt rock—which might sound familiar, says space technologist Mihkel Pajusalu of the University of Tartu in Estonia.
“For example, from science fiction, we know, from Stars Wars: Episode III, Mustafar planet ...”
[CLIP: Star Wars scene]
Kinda like that but, you know, without the light sabers. Scientists had noticed that some of these real lava worlds were extraordinarily bright and reflective. But why?
“There was the idea that maybe it comes from the fact lava itself is basically a liquid, and a smooth surface can reflect light. Like the surface of water, for example.”
So Pajusalu and his colleagues did what anyone would do to test that idea: they made their own lava. Here’s M.I.T.’s Zahra Essack, who led the team.
“When we removed the lava from the furnace, you could instantly feel the heat wash over you. Even from six feet away, it felt like you were standing right on the edge of a roaring bonfire. The crucible, which was the container holding the lava, was glowing so brightly, it made my eyes water. It was an incredible experience.”
After producing the lava, the researchers calculated its reflectivity in both the molten and solid states. And they realized that lava wasn’t reflective enough to explain these bright exoplanets they were seeing. Instead, Essack says, perhaps these planets could be remarkable in yet another way.
“We think that lava planets could have exotic reflective atmospheres consisting of silica, which is the main component of rocks, and metals like sodium and potassium that could reflect starlight and make the planets appear very bright.”
The work appears in the Astrophysical Journal. [Zahra Essack et al., Low-albedo surfaces of lava worlds]
If lava worlds feel very far away, and perhaps irrelevant, Essack brought up the fact that Earth was once covered in sloshing lava early in its formation. So by studying planets around distant stars, we might better understand the history of our own.
—Christopher Intagliata
[The above text is a transcript of this podcast.]


scientificamerican--2020-08-14--Invisible Qualities Such as 'Hardness' Can Pinpoint Objects

We spend a substantial part of our days visually scanning an area for something we want—our keys or ketchup , for example .
For scientists the way we do so “ provides a window into how our minds sift through the information that arrives at our eyes , ” says Jason Fischer , a cognitive neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins University .
Past research has focused on readily apparent visual characteristics such as color , shape and size .
But an object 's intrinsic physical properties—things we know from experience but can not see , such as hardness—also come into play @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to immediately see that a brick is heavier than a soda can and harder than a piece of cake , but you know it .
And that knowledge guides how you act on a brick as compared with those other objects , ” says Fischer , senior author on a new study led by graduate student Li Guo .
“ We asked whether that knowledge about objects ' hidden physical properties is , in itself , something you can use to locate objects faster.
” The study was published online in May in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Researchers asked study participants to pick out the image of an item in a grid of other objects as quickly as possible .
Each grid was controlled for the color , size and shape of the objects presented , so participants could not use easy visual cues .
For example , when they were asked to find a cutting board , the grid also included softer but similarly colored items such as a croissant and a bandage and similarly shaped items , among them a sponge , pillow and paper bag .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ used what they knew about an object 's hardness to find it faster , ” Fischer says .
By tracking participants ' eye movements , the team saw that people spent less time examining objects without the correct hardness .
This held even when participants assessed a grid of simplistic black-and-white line drawings in which physical traits were only implied , Guo says .
“ When I 'm searching for an object , thinking about that object summons up a variety of useful information that my mind will leverage to find it as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ It 's a built-in trick that you can use without any awareness of doing so.
” Vivian C. Paulun , a vision researcher at the University of Giessen in Germany , who was not involved in the study , says it shows that a haptic ( touch-based ) property can influence visual attention by association .
“ An obvious next step would be to test whether this effect can be replicated with other mechanical , nonvisual object properties , such as fragility , ” Paulun observes .
“ This would strengthen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ visual attention .
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We spend a substantial part of our days visually scanning an area for something we want—our keys or ketchup, for example. For scientists the way we do so “provides a window into how our minds sift through the information that arrives at our eyes,” says Jason Fischer, a cognitive neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins University. Past research has focused on readily apparent visual characteristics such as color, shape and size. But an object's intrinsic physical properties—things we know from experience but cannot see, such as hardness—also come into play.
“You may not be able to immediately see that a brick is heavier than a soda can and harder than a piece of cake, but you know it. And that knowledge guides how you act on a brick as compared with those other objects,” says Fischer, senior author on a new study led by graduate student Li Guo. “We asked whether that knowledge about objects' hidden physical properties is, in itself, something you can use to locate objects faster.” The study was published online in May in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.
Researchers asked study participants to pick out the image of an item in a grid of other objects as quickly as possible. Each grid was controlled for the color, size and shape of the objects presented, so participants could not use easy visual cues. For example, when they were asked to find a cutting board, the grid also included softer but similarly colored items such as a croissant and a bandage and similarly shaped items, among them a sponge, pillow and paper bag.
The researchers “found that people automatically used what they knew about an object's hardness to find it faster,” Fischer says. By tracking participants' eye movements, the team saw that people spent less time examining objects without the correct hardness. This held even when participants assessed a grid of simplistic black-and-white line drawings in which physical traits were only implied, Guo says.
“When I'm searching for an object, thinking about that object summons up a variety of useful information that my mind will leverage to find it as efficiently as possible,” Fischer explains. “It's a built-in trick that you can use without any awareness of doing so.”
Vivian C. Paulun, a vision researcher at the University of Giessen in Germany, who was not involved in the study, says it shows that a haptic (touch-based) property can influence visual attention by association. “An obvious next step would be to test whether this effect can be replicated with other mechanical, nonvisual object properties, such as fragility,” Paulun observes. “This would strengthen the evidence that physical object properties guide visual attention.”