Dr. Bajwa crosses the line
Mar. 7th, 2005 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sniffnoyAs if she hadn't already... but first, this observation. In Sonic 2 (and Sonic 3 and S&K), there's the Death Egg. Now, you know they just named it that because it's a fortress of evil (hence "Death") and because it was built by Dr. Eggman (hence "Egg"). But the thing is, Eggman is only called that because of his shape. I'm pretty sure, his name was always "Eggman" - as in, in English, or in katakana. I have to wonder if the Japanese creators of the game, therefore, actually ever noticed the irony of the name "Death Egg"...
Anyway, as for Dr. Bajwa. So she was giving her Power Point presentation[0] on community ecology (yes, she reduces all of community ecology to a single ppt), and up comes the thing about mimicry, Batesian and Mullerian. Batesian mimicry, we learn, is when a harmless species mimics a harmful species. On the slide is a picture of the poisonous monarch butterfly, and the harmless viceroy butterfly, which mimics it. Mullerian mimicry, we then learn, is when two harmful species mimic each other, getting a bit of cross-protection. (For those who don't know, these are in fact the correct definitions, which I (and of course Avi) knew from having read the corresponding chapter in Campbell.) On the Mullerian mimicry slide is a picture of... the monarch and viceroy butterflies!
"Dr. Bajwa," I say, "the viceroy butterfly is harmless. Doesn't that make it Batesian mimicry?"
"No," she says, "it's Mullerian."
I point out the definitions of Batesian and Mullerian mimicry. "Doesn't that make it Batesian?"
"No," she says, "Batesian mimicry is when the mimicry is just temporary; Mullerian mimicry is when it looks like the other animal all the time."
"Dr. Bajwa, that's not the definition you have up there."
Some of this may have been Avi rather than me; he did a lot of the talking, and it went on for quite a while.
She soon gave up insisting on her made-up definitions, especially after she pulled out Campbell and looked it up to find out her original definition, from the presentation, was correct. Campbell, unfortunately, did not include the example of the monarch and viceroy butterflies.
Still she could not make the connection between "Viceroy butterfly is harmless", "when one of the species is harmless, the mimicry is Batesian", and "The viceroy butterfly is an example of Batesian mimicry."
After much arguing, at one point she said that it's Mullerian mimicry because they look like each other.
"Dr. Bajwa," Avi said, "I believe that is the purpose of the word 'mimicry'."
After about 10 minutes of this, we finally got her - no, not to admit that she might be wrong! Never that! - to say, "Well, whenever I've seen it, it's been called Mullerian mimicry." We left it at that until after the class.
More boring class...
Class is over! Time for her to explain herself. She brings up a website (gotten by searching Google for "Mullerian mimicry"), which gives the correct definition of Mullerian mimicry, and has a picture of two butterflies. That's... it. A picture. No species names. "Dr. Bajwa, how do you know these are the same butterflies?" At this point I left, having to go get a drink of water from having eaten so many peanuts. Avi later told me about the rest:
She tried searching for figures; she turned up nothing with species names. "Search for text, not for figures, so we get some species names." She searched for figures. Avi told her again. Finally she searched for the viceroy and monarch butterflies, where she found out...
Apparently, it used to be thought that the viceroy butterfly was harmless (and therefore that it was Batesian), but in the 1990s they discovered that it was toxic too (and therefore Mullerian). "Oh," said Avi, "that explains why you had it on both slides." "What are you talking about?" says Dr. Bajwa. "I didn't have it on both slides."
So Avi had her open the ppt back up, and lo! The viceroy-monarch thing was not actually on the Batesian mimicry slide, but on the slide right before it; however, it was clearly meant to illustrate such, as it showed a blue jay eating a monarch butterfly, getting sick, and then refusing to eat a viceroy butterfly. And, even if it was somehow meant to demonstrate Mullerian, or mimicry in general, she had explained that very figure as an example of Batesian mimicry, saying the viceroy butterfly was harmless. Dr. Bajwa doesn't remember having done this (which she did) and still doesn't understand what the problem is. After much explanation, Avi finally gets her to say "Oh! So I should get rid of the thing with the blue jay."
Dr. Bajwa has done some pretty ridiculous things before (binomial theorem, anyone?), but as she's got tenure if she makes it through this year, Avi went and complained about all this to Dr. Niedosik, who said that if we want to complain about her, we should write a letter to Mr. Montone. So... we will.
-Sniffnoy
[0]Every lesson with her is a Power Point presentation. If it turns out she didn't make it in time, she's helpless. All she ever does is read from her ppt, which generally consists of insufficiently explained bullet points and unhelpful pictures, often totally unrelated.
Anyway, as for Dr. Bajwa. So she was giving her Power Point presentation[0] on community ecology (yes, she reduces all of community ecology to a single ppt), and up comes the thing about mimicry, Batesian and Mullerian. Batesian mimicry, we learn, is when a harmless species mimics a harmful species. On the slide is a picture of the poisonous monarch butterfly, and the harmless viceroy butterfly, which mimics it. Mullerian mimicry, we then learn, is when two harmful species mimic each other, getting a bit of cross-protection. (For those who don't know, these are in fact the correct definitions, which I (and of course Avi) knew from having read the corresponding chapter in Campbell.) On the Mullerian mimicry slide is a picture of... the monarch and viceroy butterflies!
"Dr. Bajwa," I say, "the viceroy butterfly is harmless. Doesn't that make it Batesian mimicry?"
"No," she says, "it's Mullerian."
I point out the definitions of Batesian and Mullerian mimicry. "Doesn't that make it Batesian?"
"No," she says, "Batesian mimicry is when the mimicry is just temporary; Mullerian mimicry is when it looks like the other animal all the time."
"Dr. Bajwa, that's not the definition you have up there."
Some of this may have been Avi rather than me; he did a lot of the talking, and it went on for quite a while.
She soon gave up insisting on her made-up definitions, especially after she pulled out Campbell and looked it up to find out her original definition, from the presentation, was correct. Campbell, unfortunately, did not include the example of the monarch and viceroy butterflies.
Still she could not make the connection between "Viceroy butterfly is harmless", "when one of the species is harmless, the mimicry is Batesian", and "The viceroy butterfly is an example of Batesian mimicry."
After much arguing, at one point she said that it's Mullerian mimicry because they look like each other.
"Dr. Bajwa," Avi said, "I believe that is the purpose of the word 'mimicry'."
After about 10 minutes of this, we finally got her - no, not to admit that she might be wrong! Never that! - to say, "Well, whenever I've seen it, it's been called Mullerian mimicry." We left it at that until after the class.
More boring class...
Class is over! Time for her to explain herself. She brings up a website (gotten by searching Google for "Mullerian mimicry"), which gives the correct definition of Mullerian mimicry, and has a picture of two butterflies. That's... it. A picture. No species names. "Dr. Bajwa, how do you know these are the same butterflies?" At this point I left, having to go get a drink of water from having eaten so many peanuts. Avi later told me about the rest:
She tried searching for figures; she turned up nothing with species names. "Search for text, not for figures, so we get some species names." She searched for figures. Avi told her again. Finally she searched for the viceroy and monarch butterflies, where she found out...
Apparently, it used to be thought that the viceroy butterfly was harmless (and therefore that it was Batesian), but in the 1990s they discovered that it was toxic too (and therefore Mullerian). "Oh," said Avi, "that explains why you had it on both slides." "What are you talking about?" says Dr. Bajwa. "I didn't have it on both slides."
So Avi had her open the ppt back up, and lo! The viceroy-monarch thing was not actually on the Batesian mimicry slide, but on the slide right before it; however, it was clearly meant to illustrate such, as it showed a blue jay eating a monarch butterfly, getting sick, and then refusing to eat a viceroy butterfly. And, even if it was somehow meant to demonstrate Mullerian, or mimicry in general, she had explained that very figure as an example of Batesian mimicry, saying the viceroy butterfly was harmless. Dr. Bajwa doesn't remember having done this (which she did) and still doesn't understand what the problem is. After much explanation, Avi finally gets her to say "Oh! So I should get rid of the thing with the blue jay."
Dr. Bajwa has done some pretty ridiculous things before (binomial theorem, anyone?), but as she's got tenure if she makes it through this year, Avi went and complained about all this to Dr. Niedosik, who said that if we want to complain about her, we should write a letter to Mr. Montone. So... we will.
-Sniffnoy
[0]Every lesson with her is a Power Point presentation. If it turns out she didn't make it in time, she's helpless. All she ever does is read from her ppt, which generally consists of insufficiently explained bullet points and unhelpful pictures, often totally unrelated.
no subject
Date: 2005-03-08 01:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-08 02:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-09 02:51 am (UTC)-Syd
no subject
Date: 2005-03-09 02:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-06-19 01:08 am (UTC)Dr. Bajwa stole our example! Monarch-Viceroy was definitely one of our examples for our presentation on mimicry in Science Outreach. Also, the Viceroy butterfly is merely bad-tasting as a result of salicylic acid from the willow trees in which its caterpillars live while the Monarch is poisonous, having accumulated cardenolides from eating milkweed as caterpillars. Another interesting tidbit about the Viceroy butterfly is that it mimics the Monarch butterfly in regions where the Monarch lives and the Queen butterfly in regions where the Queen butterfly lives.