I'm IRKED....it seems like a small thing, but....

A friend sent me a message about a new shark type that has been discovered.

"Science never sleeps, even when facing down a hurricane. Luckily for a handful of deep sea explorers, they've found a rather unusual nightlight.
This still photo from a video taken on August 22 shows the first visual evidence of the fluorescent chain catshark. Scientists taking part in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Operation Deep Scope 2005 expedition found the three-foot-long (one-meter-long) animal on the sea floor of the Gulf of Mexico.

The fluorescent shark was initially observed—though not captured on film—during last year's Deep Scope expedition. Starstruck researchers noted that the glowing menace bears an uncanny resemblance to the fictional jaguar shark pursued by Bill Murray in the 2004 movie The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.

Deep Scope 2005 researchers found this shark only days before Hurricane Katrina moved over the Gulf of Mexico on August 27. At its peak, Katrina was listed as a Category Five storm, with winds reaching 175 miles an hour (280 kilometers an hour). The expedition ship waited out the storm at a Texas port while research continued onboard.

—Victoria Gilman"

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I thought the picture was very cool. And then I read the article and I saw red. This line "noted that the glowing menace"....

Menace? The shark is about 3 feet long.

I sent a message to her with this information in it:
Ms. Gilman, a quick check of the Marinebio.org website, http://marinebio.org/species.asp?id=96, says this about the chain catshark:
Warnings & Comments
Harmless. Very little currently known about most catsharks due to their deepwater nature and relatively low abundance.

It irks me so much that she calls this shark a "menace" when it appears to be anything but. If we don't know that much about it how can we rightly call it a menace? Has it ever attacked anyone? What about the fact that people are far more dangerous to sharks than the shark is to people?

Yes, I'm annoyed. Yes, I wrote a letter to the National Geographic (where the article appeared) and I also wrote a letter to the author.

But still....I'm annoyed.

<SIGH>

Thanks for letting me get that off my chest.

No different than adding "welfare addicted" to "African american" or any other great range of racist epithets.

Why the need to use such a word in this article? That's very bad science.

"Menace" indeed. They just saw the thing for the first fucking time two weeks ago!

It appears that the woman who wrote the article also has done interviews explaining "bad science" in movies.

That made me laugh. She has the nerve to talk about bad science when she herself is guilty of it, too.

And I think the thing that annoyed me the most is that this article is listed on dozens of sites. Sure, let's get people to think this shark is a danger. Let's call him Jaws V or VI and hunt him down and kill him.

YES, YES, I am annoyed. I can't help myself. :O(

.....oh, no wait. That IS a shark.

Nevermind.

Goldfish?

Heh heh. Yeah. Sure.