Hi there, and thanks for coming to The Cipher!
I've basically been in an NHL preview hole this week—it's almost time! But we've got some good blogs for you up on Defector. Here they are.
-Lauren |
In Rumaan Alam’s ‘Entitlement,’ Money Comes At The Expense Of Everything Else
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Israel Uses The Same Pretense For New Bloodshed
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Go Ahead And Assume The Worst About The Pittsburgh Pirates
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Three Things We Liked On The Internet Today:
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Creature Drops: A New Species Of Predatory, Invasive Flatworm in the United States |
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Well, well, well, if it isn’t a new species of predatory flatworm in the United States! You might be wondering, "Isn’t this worm simply Obama nungara, or the Obama flatworm, an invasive worm from Brazil and Argentina that now slithers around most of Europe?" But you would be wrong. This is a totally different species of flatworm that only looks identical to the Obama flatworm, so much so that this new flatworm has been named Amaga pseudobama. Now you might be wondering, "Isn’t it somewhat rude to name a species of an invasive worm after former president Barack Obama?" I, too, was wondering this. But apparently Obama nungara is named after two words of Brazil’s Tupi language—oba, meaning leaf, and ma, meaning animal—as the worm resembles a flattened leaf. Obama, however, has become a namesake for plenty other unsettling animals, such as Baracktrema obamai, a parasitic flatworm living in the lungs of turtles, and Aptostichus barackobamai, the Barack Obama trapdoor spider.
But back to Amaga pseudobama, which looks so much like the Obama flatworm that when the flat, dark brown worm was glimpsed in a North Carolina plant nursery in 2020, everyone assumed it was an Obama flatworm that somehow hitchhiked to the southeast. But after researchers conducted a molecular study of a worm they assumed was an Obama flatworm, they realized the species was totally different, belonging to a genus of worms called Amaga that are almost all found in South America. Amaga pseudobama has only been identified in North Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, meaning scientists are still unsure where exactly it came from. For any flatworm freaks trying to see some gorgeous images of the histology of a flatworm testis, check out their full paper, published in the journal PeerJ.
Although A. pseudobama might not look intimidating, it is a predator—earthworms and slugs beware!—and it has likely been spreading in the United States for a decade. There’s a lesson here for all of us, I think. Not all small, slimy brown worms are the same. And not all species with Obama in their name are named after Obama.
-Sabrina Imbler
Image: Matt Bertone |
A Cool Page From An Old Book |
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I'm going through a bit of a "classics streak" in my reading right now, and as part of this I recently finished Dracula, as in the original Bram Stoker novel. I prefer its first half to its second, where it gets so long-winded at times I was surprised to learn it wasn't originally serialized. But in that first half you get Jonathan Harker's iconic visit to Castle Dracula and then, spoilers, the vampire transformation of a young woman named Lucy which sets the stakes (no pun intended) for what's to come.
Dracula is a novel that's organized by primary sources, and so the story of Lucy's deteriorating condition is told mostly by the notes of a doctor who's watching over her. In this sense, her supernatural fate comes in a grounded, clinical tone that increases the authenticity of the terrifying threat at hand. But then also, Van Helsing shows up, bringing with him some key vampire theories, and near the very end of Lucy's arc he has to break some horrible news to his partner, the doctor. On this page, I love the slow build to the reveal, the extra helpings of emotional turmoil, and the forcefulness of the chapter-ender. Of course everyone who reads it today knows what's coming, but Stoker set it up for maximum impact.
-Lauren |
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