Status Updates From Below the Edge of Darkness:...

(2/2) The capture is performed in the interest of research, yes, but Widder's narrative so far is distinctly short on information about the treatment and/or of the captured creatures. What happens to them? Is it fair of us to continually extract life from the deep ocean just to poke and prod at its photophores so we can better our naval forces?

“When possible, it’s far better to capture the creature and hold it in a confined space.” Sure, but is it ethical? The more we learn about mycology and trees the more we're inclined to respect our arboreal friends, so doesn't it make sense that deep sea creatures (who are genetically closer to us) should be treated with the same respect we provide plants and fungi?

i probably should've saved this book for a week more focused on deepwater research.

oh wow I extremely underestimated the difficulty of this book. it has SO much more ACTUAL SCIENCE than I had expected. more like a textbook than a leisure read. might take a bit to work my way through this!

“ In a highly efficient reaction, one photon is equivalent to the hydrolysis of about 6 ATPs… in a less efficient reaction, it may be 10 times that. So a single celled microscopic dinoflagellate that emits about 10^10 photons per flash is using the up that [ATP] at a rate of between 60 billion and 600 billion ATPs per flash.” THIS FOOTNOTE JUST REWIRED MY ENTIRE BRAIN. THE DINOFLAGELLATES ARE DOING W H A T ?