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A seamstress who solved the ancient mystery of the Argonaut
- dr_dshiv 4y agoTheMarginalian is my favorite piece of the internet. So much beauty.
- Jun8 4y ago+1000. Not only her writing is fantastic, the articles are also extensively linked to each other, so you can easily spend 1-2 hours jumping from one excellent article to another. I have learned about so many people from the Marginalian. If you want to delve may I suggest: * The unfortunate story of Virginia Frances Sterrett, an illustrator of great talent: https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/01/27/virginia-frances-sterrett-old-french-fairy-tales https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/01/27/virginia-frances-s... * Maria Mitchell, the astronomer, who was the “first woman employed by the American federal government for a ‘specialized non-domestic skill’”: https://www.themarginalian.org/2021/04/03/maria-mitchell-telescope/ https://www.themarginalian.org/2021/04/03/maria-mitchell-tel... * Ursula Le Guin on being a man: https://www.themarginalian.org/2014/10/17/ursula-k-le-guin-gender/ https://www.themarginalian.org/2014/10/17/ursula-k-le-guin-g... * Popova’s review of the book Literary Witches, An Illustrated Celebration of Trailblazing Women Writers Who Have Enchanted and Transformed the World: https://www.themarginalian.org/2018/02/07/literary-witches/ https://www.themarginalian.org/2018/02/07/literary-witches/
- irrational 4y agoThis quote from Ursula Le Guin struck me as funny >Sex is even more boring as a spectator sport than all the other spectator sports I think the massive popularity of porn on the Internet would argue against this assertion.
- telesilla 4y agoI think you miss the point, she's taking the perspective of a failed man. In general, porn is pretty boring to her compared to the act itself. She states this by saying she'd rather watch show jumping while having sex, over watching sex. (I'm in her court and anecdotally so are many other women).
- thaumasiotes 4y ago> Since women were excluded from the scientific establishment, unable to attend universities or present at learned societies, her research traveled into the world by proxy. > By the end of her long life, Jeanne Villepreux-Power belonged to more than a dozen scientific societies. The exclusion doesn't seem to have been very strict.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- lostlogin 4y agoIt’s presumably easier to get accepted if your first work is good, original and presented by a member of the establishment. I wonder what progress humans would have made if an inclusive approach had been taken a few hundred or thousand years earlier?
- poulpy123 4y agoIf you're talking about scientific research especially, not much because it was not a shortage of people that limited research.
- djbusby 4y agoI feel like we'd be super advanced if we'd just stop arguing about petty shit.
- Maursault 4y ago> I feel like we'd be super advanced if we'd just stop arguing about petty shit. If everyone always agreed, science and technology would stagnate. Disagreement drives advancement.
- moistly 4y agoPlease, explain how disagreement over petty shit drives advancement. By my understanding, petty shit is of no value, and thus unimportant to advancement of anything but resentment and dismissal, and indeed is an inhibitor of progress. (Irony acknowledged.)
- smitty1e 4y ago> Schopenhauer’s exquisite insight that “talent is like the marksman who hits a target which others cannot reach [whereas] genius is like the marksman who hits a target which others cannot even see.” Great quote in a great article. Thank you.
- Izkata 4y ago> Walking the shoreline and wading into the sea in her long skirts, she fell in love with one of Earth’s most alien life-forms: the small sepia-like octopus Argonauta argo Wellp, nothing to do with the Argonauts from Greek mythology [0], I clicked wondering what the mystery was and if it had anything to do with the Golden Fleece... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argonauts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argonauts
- snthpy 4y agoSame here
- IncRnd 4y agoSame here, too
- adrian_b 4y agoActually the current name "Argonauta argo" is taken directly from the Argonauts from Greek mythology. The Ancient Greeks used the name "nautilos" for it. Confusingly, now the name "Nautilus" is used for a completely unrelated genus of cephalopods. While many biologists or mineralogists who have coined scientific names for animals, plants or minerals have taken Greek or Latin words from ancient authors, like Pliny the Elder, Aristotle or Theophrastus, most of them have been too lazy to actually read the old books. Because of that, while most ancient names of animals, plants and minerals have been reused in the modern scientific terminology, many of them have very different meanings now, which occasionally confuses those who browse some old books, from Antiquity or from the Middle Ages, where the original meanings of the words are used. Because the philologists are usually ignorant about biology and mineralogy, the dictionaries of ancient languages frequently contain erroneous definitions for the words denoting animals, plants or minerals, so they are not very helpful.
- moloch-hai 4y agoI had never heard of Jeanne Villepreux-Power, or of the papered nautilus, before just this moment. Nor of the Marginalian, a singularly fascinating magazine. Subscribing! I foresee many happy hours of exploration and discovery. Thank you, jelliclesfarm!
- garethrees 4y agoJeannette Power's "Observations physiques sur le poulpe de l'Argonauta argo" (1856) is available at the Internet Archive [1]. [1] https://archive.org/details/b2228476x https://archive.org/details/b2228476x
- muststopmyths 4y agothe great research work aside, her drawing is lovely.
- tgv 4y agoIt wasn't just women who were excluded, the poor didn't stand a chance at all. It's clear that Jeanne had the means to set up underwater cages and build a marine lab, and more than enough time to spend on her studies. The article's title calls her a "seamstress", but that is unrelated.