by Thomas Fernandes A common sensational science fact that used to be mentioned is that matter is mostly empty space. Crazy right?! It comes from a real observation that at the atomic level, there are only a few very tiny electrons to occupy the vast distance between nuclei, leaving most of the space technically empty.…

by Thomas Fernandes High-acuity vision and depth perception give Portia a detailed and stable visual world. But vision alone does not explain why Portia is famous. What makes this genus remarkable is not just what it can see, but how it uses what it sees to manipulate the perceptual systems of other spiders. Portia does…

by Thomas Fernandes Last time, we explored how insects navigate and hunt using motion-based vision, and how these perceptual interfaces can themselves be exploited by dragonflies using motion camouflage to trick conspecifics. In this essay, we shift from insects to spiders, and from motion cues to the many sensory strategies spiders use to sense their…

by Thomas Fernandes In Part I, we explored how bees navigate without depth perception, using optic flows to fly straight through tunnels, land smoothly, and estimate distance traveled. The visual system we examined works beautifully in providing simple navigation tools to solve complex tasks, leaving brain power for other activities such as pattern identification, nectar…

by Thomas Fernandes This series began with the desire to share a more diverse and lifelike account of biodiversity than the more mediatized utilitarian framing used in reporting, awareness campaigns, or pleas for conservation. This position is far from unique; the philosopher Arne Naess articulated the  deep ecology movement more than 30 years ago, in…

by Thomas Fernandes Part I can be seen here. Being obligate scavengers, vultures are highly dependent on finding carrion, an unpredictable and patchy resource. This sometimes means going without food for two to three weeks while actively scouting 200 km per day. Unlike other animals that evolved strategies to enable them to secure food by…

by Thomas Fernandes In the natural world, predation may mark the end of life, but it doesn’t signal the end of ecological interactions. The hunt, with all its challenges and shifting interactions, is not an end in itself, it only creates the opportunity to feed. O    nce the kill is made, two main strategies emerge:…

by Thomas Fernandes Like the Thomson’s gazelle of Part I, the white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) evolved an ability to communicate with predators. Not by stotting but by flagging the white underside of their tail. Why is this considered communication? Communication requires intention, distinguishing a cue from a signal. To a deer, a predator’s smell coming…

by Thomas Fernandes To be alive is to maintain a coherent structure in a variable environment. Entropy favors the dispersal of energy, like heat diffusing into the surroundings. Cells, like fridges, resist this drift only by expending energy. At the base of the food chain, energy is harvested from the sun; at the next layer,…

by Thomas Fernandes A rodent with orange teeth and a paddle tail comes across a river. He tries to build a lodge but the stream is too low so he grunts, “Dam!”. While the pun captures the beaver in miniature, the real story lies in the web of relationships that shapes it and the ecosystem…

by Thomas Fernandes In part I we’ve seen how bees fly and generate astonishing metabolic energy just to remain airborne. But what do they do with that flight? As exemplified by nectar foraging, taking advantage of flight also means developing the perceptual and cognitive tools necessary to navigate the world. So far this was a…

by Thomas Fernandes Interest often begins in surprise. It may arise from the encounter of something new or the clarity of insight, when a complex thing finds a simple resolution. We may also be blind in two ways. The first lies in what we fail to notice, and thus cannot be surprised by. The other…

by Thomas Fernandes We might know more about biodiversity than ever before, yet we see it less. When life is talked about as “carbon sinks,” “pollinator services,” or “extinction curves,” it flattens into numbers: computable but unfeeling. But the loss we face isn’t just biological. It’s perceptual. We no longer notice life. Our first loss,…