The Google Doodle for today, January 11, 2012, deserves a mention here. It honors Nicolas Steno, the 17th century Danish scientist who refused to simply accept things on faith. He's a main figure in the opening chapter to Brian Switek's Written in Stone, for the very good reason that he was the man who first struck on the idea that the stone shark's teeth found all over Europe had once been the teeth of living sharks, and burial under the sea floor had eventually petrified them. He set us on the path that would lead to the science of paleontology. Very cool to see his place in the history of science given the spotlight by Google today.
Brilliant.
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