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Dwarf Dinosaurs, Giant Skunks

June 11, 2006

Sun! Pouring through the window when I woke up. (Which still was later than usual because Rhodry the Insistent Malamutt woke me up at 4 a.m. and it did me no good to remind him that at 11:30 he swore he didn't need to go out, he was fine for the night.) And dry air blowing into the room. Wow.

* * *

Another one of my birthday presents: A friend e-mailed me an Associated Press story, as published in the online Boston Globe. "Island life may have led to dwarf dinosaurs": how could I possibly resist?

"German scientists say they've discovered a species that evolved into a dwarf, ending up only about one-third the size of its closest known relatives. . . .

"The researchers say it's a case of island dwarfism, the tendency of big species to shrink over time when they find themselves on an island. It's a well-known occurrence among mammals. For example, fossil elephants only about 3 feet tall were found in Sicily.

"Scientists think that in an environment of limited resources, smaller body size becomes an advantage, so captive populations shrink in body size over long periods of time."

Aha, I thought, rather uncharitably; this goes a long way to explaining many of the elected officials in most Vineyard towns! Except that the dwarfism doesn't apply to their bodies: the ones I'm thinking of aren't noticeably smaller than their off-island counterparts; in some cases, quite the contrary. What's affected is their minds, particularly the parts that control cooperation, logical thinking, and understanding of cause and effect (sometimes called "truth or consequences").

Possibly this isn't what the German scientists had in mind, but think about it. In an environment of limited mental resources, diminished mental capacity becomes an advantage. In any fairly tight community, where most people know (or at least know of) most of the others, a person's effectiveness depends on not sticking out too much. If you're middling observant and you've been here a while, you know way more about your neighbors than is entirely comfortable, and you have to assume that your neighbors include at least a few middlingly observant individuals who know an awful lot about you. So being effective also means pulling your punches, or, better yet, not throwing any. Over time the capacity to speak the truth diminishes, and in close correlation so does the ability to recognize it.

The limited resources of Martha's Vineyard include a decided lack of diversity in economic opportunities, which is to say "ways of earning a living," and the higher the wage, the scarcer the options. So many, many people wind up dependent on the building trades, real estate brokerage, and the "hospitality industry" -- the voracious trinity that is making our habitat unlivable. Intellectually we have to know that soiling our own nest is not smart in the long term, but we're too busy making a living (and not rocking the boat) to think about it.

I'm reminded by a self-described "recovering herpetologist" that in insular environments, some species that have no predators evolve to abnormally large size; some giant tortoises and the Komodo dragon were mentioned. I noted that on Martha's Vineyard skunks have no natural predators (other than motor vehicles) and they don't seem any bigger than their off-island cousins. "Give them time," my correspondent advised. (The island's hunting fraternity is gung ho to expand Deer Week to Deer Fortnight, all in the interest of reducing the tick population and saving us from Lyme disease. What would it take to motivate them to hunt skunks, in the interest of avoiding the giant skunks that evolution may have in mind for us?)

Meanwhile, stupidity and short-sightedness are flourishing in the absence of their natural predators: clear thinking, brave speaking, and a willingness to inquire within instead of blaming everything on scapegoats. Here's a hunting season I could support wholeheartedly: 52 weeks a year, 24/7, no weapons allowed.

Thanks to Wendy P. for the article and David H. "the recovering herpetologist" for the commentary. They furnished the raw material but shouldn't be held responsible for what I did with it.

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