Visit to the Manchester Museum

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Visit to the Manchester Museum

Museums are among my favourite places. Never do they fail to instil a sense of wonder and belittlement in me... especially the sections on pre-historic life and cosmology. Nadha and I spent the day at the Manchester Museum yesterday, ogling and gawking at all those things on display.

I adored the dinosaur on display - a Tyrannosaurus rex named Stan. It is a cast replica from the original and consists of 199 bones that have been discovered. Standing at about 20ft tall and 35ft long, the thing is just gigantic. I only come up to its knees! I was introduced to dinosaurs when I was very young via a book on dinosaurs. It came with special glasses for viewing the special 3D renditions of dinosaurs, including a T Rex. Yet, none of the books, pictures or even movies prepare one for the massively awe-inspiring sight of a real-life fossil reconstruction of the beast!

Anyway, here are some snaps from the museum visit.

Gautama Buddha

Egyptian mummies

Mummified remains of Asru, a chantress at the Temple of Amun in Karnak.

A fossilized ammonite - Ammonites are an extinct group of marine animals that lived 400 - 65 million years ago.

Fossil evidence of fern-like plant (from around 600 million years ago)

Australopithecus Afarensis (3.9 - 2.9 million years ago) - The hominid ancestor that gave rise to modern Homo species including humans!

Early homo sapiens (400,000 - 10,000 years ago)

Guess what this is? It has hands, no legs, a huge tail and a great big head.

Fossil remains of a dinosaur-like sea creature (205 - 146 million years ago)

Sea scorpians and jawless fish from the Silurian age (439 - 409 million years ago)

A reptile from the Triassic period (250 million years ago)

Stan, the Tyrannosaurus Rex (dated to 65 million years ago)

More of Stan...

A few of the beetles on display - With about 350,000 different species of beetles around, they are dubbed nature's favourite!

Enjoy.

This entry was posted by Jaa on Sunday, April 8. 2007 at 05:51. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own blog.

Defined tags for this entry: personal, photos, science, travel

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Jaheen says:

#1 2007-04-08 08:00 (Reply)

how come the egyptian mummies ended up in a museum in Manchester? would've been better if they were kept in Egypt.. anyways, nice pics..

Nishan says:

#2 2007-04-08 15:46 (Reply)

i think this gives me a great idea. lets make a dummy maumoon mummy and send it to Manchester. I hope this will make jantey happy.

Jaa nice work. Thanks for sharing

Murasakishikibu says:

#3 2007-04-09 16:17 (Reply)

how could you have completely missed out the mention of the Japanese Samurai Armourage on Display. The beautifully crafted, elegant fighting gear!! the Samurai Swords! WEAPONS OF WAR! also the stuffed LIONS and bears which are DEFINITELY NOT REAL LIFE CASTS BUT REAL!! The shell helmet from the Island Soldier?
what about those bouncing balls from the gift shop??
nah go back again! you have much more to learn my son! I give you a FAIL.
tsk tsk .. a replica t-rex sceleton as the pinnacle...tsk tsk or was it the smell of grilled cheese sandwitch from the refectory!

jaa says:

#3.1 2007-04-10 12:19 (Reply)

how cud i indeed! hehe. i went to the museum on two days, explored the samurai and the historical stuff the first time around. didnt have the camera, so no snaps! i related from the 2nd day when i did have the camera.

anyway, ppl get fascinated by different things me gets off on dinosaurs.. that's all...

Frozen Solid says:

#4 2007-04-10 00:29 (Reply)

wow. have u ever played pokemon. if so u would have seen what all those fossils would turn out to be. hehe.

Observer says:

#5 2007-04-15 18:33 (Reply)

Well thats great you have presented some nice stuff...But I wonder why you are trying to hide the real reason why you have presented these pictures...Well you could say you love dinosaurs...But cant it be because you wanted to write this pice?
"Australopithecus Afarensis (3.9 - 2.9 million years ago) - The hominid ancestor that gave rise to modern Homo species including humans!" Well done jaa..But you are an EDUCATED FOOL if you have believed this... You have got a lot to read about and discover...Be a hero when you are one!

jaa says:

#5.1 2007-04-16 12:01 (Reply)

I love dinosaurs and they totally fascinate me.... it's simple as that.

I AM a fool for accepting strong evidence - fossil, dna etc - and accepting a scientific process that explains the diversity of life. There definitely IS a lot I need to read up - I accept that whole heartedly - but I do suggest that you have an even larger amount of material to read. It may well be worth it to add a bit of non-fiction to your reading rather than the usual fiction

Passer by says:

#5.1.1 2007-04-21 09:09 (Reply)

u believe those so called evidence...
i can tell you that those evidence are false!!!
there is nothing that can be called an evolution
Apes and human has billions of genes diference in their sequence, type and number.
And its not all about DNA..
Even if u have DNA...it doesnt necesarily be seen outside...
the protein needed for the genes to be expressed should be made in the body..
this is the reason many genes are not expressed in our body...
and the photoabout "early homos" ...
there has never been found a transitional state of evolution
and there is no proof to show that these skulls are from a transition or just a abonormal human...
u can see many people with malformed skulls within human beings...
if ever there was evolution
and since it "took millions of year"
many generations of those species which led to humans...should be found...
and if you ever learn about how precise every molecule in human body works
and if there was a single diference...it cud have led to a syndrome..
one protein in the eye doesnt work...cud lead to blindness...
n just all it needs is one shift in the bases of genes...
MAN TRYING TO DEFY THE TRUTH TOLD BY THEIR CREATOR AND TRY TO PROVE A WRONG THEORY WILL LEAD TO NOTHING.
AND IF YOU BELIEVE EVOLUTION...YOU ARE WRONG
AND YOU WILL END UP IN THE WRONG PLACE CALLED "HELL"
AND IF YOU DONT BELIEVE IN ANY RELIGION
ITS UPTO YOU..
BUT EVEN THEN...YOU ARE LIVING THIS WORLD WITH A WRONG BELIEF IF U ONLY CARE ABOUT THIS WORLD...
May Allah lead you to right path!!

jaa says:

#5.1.1.1 2007-04-23 19:21 (Reply)

Fossil evidence have been, and are still being, independently discovered over much of the globe. Dinosaurs are a fact. Evolution too is a fact that we can observe even today. Know how viruses/bacteria develop resiliency? The time line of the earth, in millions of years, is a fact. Geological, radiological, biological dating methods all independently assert the same thing.

Apes and humans have "billions" of genes different? Seriously dude, read up... Apes, pre-human hominids and humans have been proven to share in the upwards of 95% of genes, with studies indicating that humans and neanderthals share 99.5% of the genes.

The human body is certainly not perfect - any biologist, any doctor would be able to tell you that much at the least. The human is one big fault machine - generating faulty cells all the time. However, it is also equipped with a resilient error correction and maintenance system. However, slip-ups DO occur and occur often. Cancers... ever heard of what they are??? Ever heard of Tay-Sach's disease?

Believing in evolution means I end up in hell? There are a lot of educated Muslims/theists who all accept evolution as scientific fact. They are as steadfast in their belief as you, yet they see no reason to reject the theory because accepting it does not have any implications other than weak-ego's being hurt. If that's your fear, then reality is indeed not your cuppa-tea and better stick with sucking on the pacifier!

nass says:

#6 2007-04-16 09:32 (Reply)

Its GAUtama Buddha.. not GUAtama Buddha

jaa says:

#6.1 2007-04-16 11:25 (Reply)

thanks nass. spelling slip

subcorpus says:

#7 2007-04-19 02:52 (Reply)

hello there ...
long time comment from me here ... hehe ...
nice pics ... phone camera ?
buddha looks majestic ...
any other planned trips ...
or are you on one now ... (hence, no blog posts) ...

Mmsf says:

#8 2007-04-21 09:17 (Reply)

If you wana tell me about evolution
please begin from bacteria.
First...
An accident took place in the sea. produced a cell ...so complicated that even human with all technology cant produce one..
made by accident!!!
A single celled organism which reproduces asexually
and has no sex..
and it produced a Y genes?
then a female?
and both evolved equally together
and suddenly the when it came to dianasaurs
...
tell me what happened!!

thanx
!!!!

YOU ARE "EDUCATED" FOOL
educated by wrong information
living life in misunderstanding
and dieing for nothing
only to burn in hell

jaa says:

#8.1 2007-04-23 19:39 (Reply)

You are gravely misinformed/miseducated about evolution.

The theory says nothing of how the process started. How it started is still under scientific inquiry and there are many competing theories of which the "primordial soup" theory (which you allude to) is one suggestion.

"made by accident!!!":
There are billions upon billions of stars in the universe. Assuming that your so-called "Accident" of life takes place only in 1 in a billion stars, that means there'd be about a billion places with life on them. Humans can't yet replicate this starting sequence precisely because we have no information on this presumably once-off event that triggered the evolutionary mechanism that brought out the diversity we see today. There are and have been many studies into replicating this fundamental step towards life and the results are interesting. Self-replicating molecules are a start isnt it??

The progression of organisms from single celled to multicellular, asexual to sexual, from micro to macro follows a logical process that indeed has the power of explaining much of what we know about living things. Seriously, if you don't know... pick up a decent book and read!

Mmsf says:

#8.1.1 2007-04-23 20:43 (Reply)

if evolution were to be true...
just one example...
formation of ADP (form of ATP)
whcih is required for all metabolic reactions)
and the formation of GDP (GTP)
formation of ATP requires GTP
and formation of GTP requires ATP
what came first?
does that mean that a molecule of ATP and GTP were formed at once..."by chance of eveolution"?
and if at all this reaction did not occur in the body...the organism dies!!!
if the organism dies..no question of evolution...
mutation in single celled organism are true..
but mutations that are advantageous..
are very very very very rare!!!
and imagining a mutation in a multicellular organism...if a cell is mutated its destroyed...by phagocytes..
and u have said in a post that its 99.5% similar...
do u know how much is 0.5% of diference?
u wud have thought 0.5 is so small...but wen u compare it with the total nu,ber of nucliotide bases in the body...
its millions
Humans were created as a seperate organism..
just like all other organisms
Apes were created separately..
First human being is Adam according to Quran.."then how can muslims be muslims believing in evolution"??
Evolution theory is yet to be proven...
And all the miracles in Quran is true..
why do u believe a theory that is unproven rather than the word of Allah?
and if u go into details, by going through the molecular biology of human...the biochemical reactions...
evolution theory has no place to explain that...
evolution theory itself is a question rather than the answer...
Human are subject to diseases...every creation is subject to falter..
Who said we are a perfect creation?
Ofcourse we are the most perfect creation..
doesnt mean we are 100% perfect!!
Many doctors arent good in biochemistry..
they just learn it superficially to understand physiology..
We ourselves are too weak and dont even know the secret to our brain n mind...how can we explain the origin of ourselves...
Quran explains bigbang as the begining of time..
but it doesnt give the exact details of what caused it or who created the "point of that high energy"
I hope you find the truth and May Allah show you the right path...
Thanx..
n btw nice pics...

jaa says:

#8.1.1.1 2007-04-23 23:41 (Reply)

Which came first? Chicken or the egg?

ATP/GTP/CTP/UTP and many of the other essential chemicals are indeed essential in the life systems that exist today. First, however, this does not go at all towards discrediting the notion that there most certainly were chemical predecessors that performed the same process before these solutions were found. Second, given that evolution is a massive process - in size (in terms of parallelization) and frequency - the very changes under evolutionary process can be expected to give rise to occasions where the solution is reached and is not outside the scope of realistic probability. Infact, many of the evolutionary paths in real life and in simulation tend to converge on certain "stable" solutions independently. What remains, despite years of creationist efforts, is that honest scientific, intellectual inquiry persists. Science is driven not by foretold truths but by taking on board evidence, hypothesizing and then experimenting to confirm. There isn't a global scam to dishonour the creationists - there just isn't evidence for what they suggest. Evolution remains a theory with the power to explain most of the empirical evidence across the scale and just like any scientific theory it is revised and refined as we discover more.

The percentage of shared genetic material is very important for it is indicative of what two organisms are composed of. Humans and birds do not share much, humans and most other animals do not share much yet humans and certain primates share a whopping 99.8% of genetic material. Did God make a slight variation of genes and deemed those primates as "human" and divinely tasked with following the creator? By saying that animals were created separately, do you mean to say that God actively participates in the functioning of the world and is actively creating new species? When did God see it as fit to put humans on earth? Did God play a game of placing almost-human-like animals just before placing humans? And neatly wiped them out? The theory of evolution is an answer to one of life's big questions: life itself and how it developed(and develops). A creationist assertion, on the otherhand, is guilty of intellectual dishonesty by dodging answers to critical questions and making no attempt to prove/verify their claims. You subscribe to a God-of-the-gaps argument by saying that there's X that we dont know. The critical point you miss is that many of the things you mention, including the secrets of the mind and brain, are things that are being discovered/uncovered. You cannot claim something purely because you don't know how/why.

The bigbang wasn't intended to answer how it started - it fills the gap in our knowledge of the universe towards explaining the processes that shaped the universe that is today.

There are thousands of religions and thousands of God on this planet. Yet, you believe in the God you believe purely because you were born into it. You reject every other belief system as stupid, ignorant and unworthy probably with no attempt to understand them. Your destiny was handed to you on a platter by your parents and society. You believe in your particular interpretation of a book and believe in your particular understanding of the teachings that encompass what you believe. You accepted the axioms presented therein and reject any objective stance on anything that contravenes with what you've been told to believe. You reject any evidence that disagrees with you as false. You call anyone who contravenes what you believe, even if they essentially follow the same thing as you, an infidel and label them as on the wrong path. In effect, there isn't a chance that you are wrong on anything... because you just know what you believe is true and have no evidence to show for it. Could there possibly be a more arrogant, self-obsessed, deluded stance than this?

Thank you for your comments. I wish you the best and hope you are keen to atleast continue discussion with an open-mind.

Mmsf says:

#8.1.1.1.1 2007-05-03 09:27 (Reply)

Did you mean to say you're an atheist?

Aisha says:

#9 2007-04-21 14:22 (Reply)

hey impressed with ur pics but I dont like the point"Australopithecus Afarensis (3.9 - 2.9 million years ago) - The hominid ancestor that gave rise to modern Homo species including humans!". Do u belive in tat. Just asking ingay.tc

jaa says:

#9.1 2007-04-23 19:43 (Reply)

Ah, you dont like it because it delivers a blow to your ego as a superior entity? Nothing, absolutely nothing, humans have discovered have suggested anything other than that we are the same as any other animals - that we are machines and the only thing that differentiates humans from the rest seems to be the conciousness that's arisen in the former.

Nadha says:

#9.1.1 2007-04-24 03:51 (Reply)

Consciousness arose in humans, Jaa? There is evidence to the contrary, whether you are referring to phenomenal consciousness or self-consciousness. Break down the term, luv, 'cox "consciousness" is far too broad and vague. The real debate is how far down the evolutionary line did consciousness arise.

In my opinion, what makes humans different from other great apes is our ability to effectively communicate with language, especially our ability to communicate abstract concepts amongst other things.

Radvixen says:

#10 2007-04-21 23:20 (Reply)

ohh kewlness!

M says:

#11 2007-04-22 15:27 (Reply)

Jaa,

If you were spawned from a bacterium, how is it that you managed to grow a brain sophisticated enough to get educated?

Also, as lack of [correct] faith implies lack of correct education, I wonder how many generations of Maldivians have being mis-educated by the foreign teachers imported for the schools.

Are you sure that there can be such a thing as a million years? How can there be such a long long time? One can't even begin to imagine that long a span of history.

And that is why evolution cannot happen. Mutation is acceptable as it can modify gene structure in a relatively short period of time and affect future generations.

I hope you enjoy barbeques, coz you are invited to attend an eternal session.

And frankly, I don't believe that the so called Museum you excitedly talk about exists at all. Those are probably real pictures of fake objects.

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