Visit the new ROPP website: reflectionsonpaperspast.com

The Reflections on Papers Past project now has a new website (https://reflectionsonpaperspast.com/), which, in addition to showcasing the full interviews, uses material from the interviews in three exhibits: Thematic collections of quotes that showcase the human stories behind scientific papers (https://reflectionsonpaperspast.com/quotes/) An archive of photos and other visuals connected to the back-stores of papers (https://reflectionsonpaperspast.com/gallery/) …

Revisiting Brown 1988

In a paper published in Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology in 1988, Joel Brown developed a method to use a forager's giving up density on a resource patch to understand energetic, predation and missed opportunity costs of foraging and then demonstrated its utility, through field experiments, on an Arizonian desert rodent community. Twenty-nine years after the paper …

Revisiting Taborsky 1984

In a paper published in Animal Behaviour in 1984, Michael Taborsky presented a cost-benefit analysis of helping behaviour in the cichlid fish Lamprologus brichardi. In this species, individuals of earlier broods stay on in their parents' territories and contribute to the care of the current brood. Evidence from field observations and lab experiments, suggested that …

Revisiting Johnsingh 1983

In a paper published in the Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society in 1983, AJT Johnsingh reported the findings of his study on large mammalian predators and prey in Bandipur Tiger Reserve, Karnataka. This study formed part of Johnsingh's PhD dissertation on dholes, likely the first PhD in wildlife biology by an Indian biologist. …

Revisiting Daniels et al. 1992

In a paper published in PNAS in 1992, RJ Ranjit Daniels, NV Joshi and Madhav Gadgil reported that bird richness declined with increasing woody plant diversity and vertical stratification in natural evergreen forests in Uttara Kannada district of the Western Ghats, India - a pattern that ran counter to what was generally believed at that …

Revisiting Chapin 2004

In an article published in World Watch magazine in 2004, Mac Chapin critiqued the work and style of functioning of three big conservation NGOS -- World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Conservation International (CI), and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) -- , especially in relation to their neglect of indigenous peoples living within their areas of work. Based …

Revisiting Meyer et al. 1990

In a paper published in Nature in 1990, Axel Meyer, Thomas Kocher, Pereti Basasibwaki, and Allan Wilson, using mitochondrial DNA sequences, provided evidence in support of a monophyletic origin of the cichlid diversity in Lake Victoria. Whats more, they found that the genetic variation among these cichlids was less than within the human species suggesting …

Revisiting Packer et al. 1990

In a paper published in The American Naturalist in 1990, Craig Packer, David Scheel and Anne Pusey used field data on lions from Serengeti National Park to argue against a dominant idea at the time: grouping patterns are determined only by foraging success. Packer and colleague's observations suggested, instead, that grouping patterns are linked to …

Revisiting Cavender-Bares et al. 2004

In a paper published in The American Naturalist in 2004, Jeannine Cavender-Bares, David Ackerly, David Baum and Fakhri Bazzaz provided an explanation for the maintenance of oak diversity in local communities in North Central Florida. Cavender-Bares and colleagues found that co-occurring oaks are more distantly related that expected by chance, a pattern resulting from convergence …

Revisiting Vermeij 1977

In a paper published in Paleobiology in 1977, Geerat Vermeij examined the Mesozoic reorganisation of shallow water marine communities using gastropod skeletal geometry and other kinds of data. Based on the evidence, Vermeij argued that predation and grazing had grown stronger and become more damaging to skeletons, driving gastropod shell evolution. Forty years after the …