Thank you for posting this. Again, a demonstration why the BBC, it’s writers, and David Attenborough as a narrator are simply the best in the field of nature documentary. It’s still as sensational as the NG, still masterly filmed, but just toned down that slight little bit it needs to be taken seriously even by scientists.
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That is an embarrassment to documentary film making. The natural world is wondrous enough without having to resort to such cheesiness.
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I agree. It’s a real shame that NG for all the talent they have are hell bent on ruining it with over zealous narration.
As someone else said, the subject matter itself is interesting enough. It doesn’t need Mr Bombastic to add interest.
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Another reason not to retrieve the bodies of mountaineers who perish on the peaks.
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Nature is full of surprises.
Speaking of ants…I’ll never forget discovering (through observation) that ants were farming the aphids I was battling in my vegetable garden. (IIRC I was smoking a spliff in the garden at the time and seeing ants carry aphids to the choice shoots really blew my mind!)
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It’s like they took the BBC playbook (incredible closeup footage and time lapses), then threw out all the classiness, and went low-brow and sensationalist. I’ll stick to Planet Earth.
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My folks used to have a couple of “grow bags” in the cellar to provide mushrooms for the table.
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You should have a look at the toxoplasmosis research and narrative.
I never eat Jamón Ibérico without thinking about this. Or pet a cat without washing your hands afterwards.
I have read a fair bit of the literature, and I have some doubts. Much of the human research came out of one laboratory (Flegr’s), with erratic groups-of-convenience and no real consistency of the results, as if groups with negative outcomes were being binned. And because ethics boards frown upon taking brain samples (BOO HISS THEY ARE HOLDING BACK SCIENCE), human studies can only check for toxo exposure using antibody tests, which are not enormously reliable. So it does occur to me that this is a case of a narrative, and the click-baitiness of the claims winning out over concerns about rigour. Though it may be my toxo brain infestation that made me write that.
I am advised that a cat only sheds the infective oocysts for a short period after getting infected, and unless you are actually eating the cat poop (or vegetables contaminated with cat poop) then you’re safe. And you can safely eat uncooked meat from another intermediate host.(unless you are a felid yourself),
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