The New York Times has just announced the winner (in the Darwin Division) of its Darwin Birthday Science Song Contest:- an engaging little ditty called "Mr Darwin, Mr Wallace, Mr Matthew", written by British song writer Mr Haines - see http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/hear-the-winning-science-songs/?hp It tells the story of Darwin and the discovery of natural selection - and unusually it highlights Wallace's and Matthew's independent discoveries of the idea as well. There are a few inaccuracies (Matthew was NOT a gardener, but a wealthy fruit grower!) but we'll ignore those.
There are two versions of the song plus videos to accompany them - the original (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBhILKsd5P8) and a 'botanical' version of the song which is part of The Great Plant Hunt, a project which aims to get UK primary school children interested in nature ( see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSFL1Z1rMoE and http://www.singtastic.com/news.php). The video of the 'botanical' song features a great animated movie by Kyle Borlase, which includes a wonderful Wallace cartoon - see below!
Also worth watching is the video discussing the history of the Matthew-Wallace-Darwin theory of natural selection - http://www.singtastic.com/player.php?id=40419010-e77f-102b-a93d-0030486584aa
For more information about the songs and Mr Haines see http://www.singtastic.com/
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Mr Wallace |
Mr Wallace by Kyle Borlase |
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