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Clues to Black Plague’s Fury in 650-Year-Old Skeletons
By NICHOLAS BAKALAR, The New York Times, January 29, 2008
Many historians have assumed that Europe’s deadliest plague, the Black Death of 1347 to 1351, killed indiscriminately, young and old, hardy and frail, healthy and sick alike. But two anthropologists were not so sure. They decided to take a closer look at the skeletons of people buried more than 650 years ago.
Their findings, published on Monday in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggest that the plague selectively took the already ill, while many of the otherwise healthy survived the infection.
( Read More )
Books: A Fight for Life Consumes Both Mother and Son
By ABIGAIL ZUGER, M.D., The New York Times, January 29, 2008
Swimming in a Sea of Death: A Son's Memoir. By David Rieff. Simon & Schuster. 180 pages. $21
“A good death” may be one of the emptiest phrases in the English language. Research has confirmed that no two people use it to mean exactly the same thing. Even the premise is unclear; for whom, exactly, is that death supposed to be good? Many would prefer a swift, sudden and painless exit for themselves — but a little warning when it comes to friends and relatives, with time to prepare and to say goodbye.
“A bad death” is another matter. We all know those when we see them, the miserably protracted and painful affairs that overwhelm everyone — the deceased and survivors alike — with panic, guilt and bitter regrets.
And now we have a new benchmark of bad. The writer Susan Sontag’s death, as set out in this short and immensely disturbing account by her son, David Rieff, must rank as one of the worst ever described.
( Read More )
Observatory: 120 Million Years Old, Fossil Shows Divergence of Platypus and Anteater
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, January 29, 2008
The platypus tops many people’s oddest mammal list, what with its ducklike bill and beaverlike tail. Its closest relatives, the echidnas, don’t get the press the platypus gets, but they are pretty weird, too, and are the only other monotremes, or egg-laying mammals, around.
( Read More )
By NICHOLAS BAKALAR, The New York Times, January 29, 2008
Many historians have assumed that Europe’s deadliest plague, the Black Death of 1347 to 1351, killed indiscriminately, young and old, hardy and frail, healthy and sick alike. But two anthropologists were not so sure. They decided to take a closer look at the skeletons of people buried more than 650 years ago.
Their findings, published on Monday in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggest that the plague selectively took the already ill, while many of the otherwise healthy survived the infection.
( Read More )
Books: A Fight for Life Consumes Both Mother and Son
By ABIGAIL ZUGER, M.D., The New York Times, January 29, 2008
Swimming in a Sea of Death: A Son's Memoir. By David Rieff. Simon & Schuster. 180 pages. $21
“A good death” may be one of the emptiest phrases in the English language. Research has confirmed that no two people use it to mean exactly the same thing. Even the premise is unclear; for whom, exactly, is that death supposed to be good? Many would prefer a swift, sudden and painless exit for themselves — but a little warning when it comes to friends and relatives, with time to prepare and to say goodbye.
“A bad death” is another matter. We all know those when we see them, the miserably protracted and painful affairs that overwhelm everyone — the deceased and survivors alike — with panic, guilt and bitter regrets.
And now we have a new benchmark of bad. The writer Susan Sontag’s death, as set out in this short and immensely disturbing account by her son, David Rieff, must rank as one of the worst ever described.
( Read More )
Observatory: 120 Million Years Old, Fossil Shows Divergence of Platypus and Anteater
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, January 29, 2008
The platypus tops many people’s oddest mammal list, what with its ducklike bill and beaverlike tail. Its closest relatives, the echidnas, don’t get the press the platypus gets, but they are pretty weird, too, and are the only other monotremes, or egg-laying mammals, around.
( Read More )
