Blue Monkeys are not noticeably blue, although the lack of fur on their faces can often give them a bluish appearance. They have a “unimale” social system, which means that usually Blue Monkey communities consist of numerous females and a single male. During breeding season, however, the number of males in a community is more variable, since several males may enter a group and compete for mating opportunities. In the course of competition, the resident male may be ousted, while a new, incoming male may go so far as to rip an infant sired by another male from the nursing female, and kill it. Some effort is made by surrounding females to protect both mother and child from their attacker, but in the end, the new male, both bigger and stronger, wins. When the mother’s reproductive ability “kicks in,” said Dr. Cords, she mates with the male that killed her child. What prompts this aggression on the part of the incoming male? Dr. Cords sees it as a reproductive strategy to “open up the resource base” for the male’s offspring, reinforcing Darwin’s notion of evolution through sexual selection. How does Dr. Cords explain the occasional consumption of the infant by the male? “Seen through cold-blooded biological lenses,” said Dr. Cords, “you’re getting a big packet of protein.” Blue Monkey females may have a counter- strategy against infanticide, Dr. Cords, explained, by mating with multiple males, even at times when conception isn’t possible. This practice casts into question the paternity of an infant, making less likely the risk of a male attacking and killing what may be his own offspring.

Reports of infanticide in various species, such as primates and rodents, are relatively recent, said Dr. Cords, dating back only about thirty years. Initially, many scientists viewed such behavior as aberrant and maladaptive, (Darwin himself refused to believe that the instincts of the lower animals were sufficiently perverse to lead to the regular practice of infanticide) but it is in fact widespread, said Dr. Cords, and jives with Darwin’s theory of adaptation.
Dr. Cords’ presentation was part of Columbia University’s Café Science series, which lately has been commemorating the two hundredth anniversary of Darwin’s birth, and the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Darwin’s “The Origin of Species.” We were given a remarkable- and yes, pretty unsavory glimpse of the goings on of our closest living relatives.

Dr. Melnick addressed two critical and related issues, namely, the decline in species populations, and the decline of genetic diversity within those species as a result of habitat fragmentation and inbreeding. A key focus of Conservation Biologists, Dr. Melnick explained, must be to help species maintain their ability to evolve under rapidly changing environmental conditions. This may mean using management strategies that “fool mother nature,” for example, planting forested corridors between forest fragments, or cross breeding vertebrates from two separate communities. We must bring, he said, “the best science to bear”, in creating environmentally sustainable management strategies that preserve genetic diversity at the highest possible level.

Dr. Melnick is more than a scientist; he is a master storyteller, who regaled his audience with engaging stories of scientific study, and survival in some less than welcoming places-countries where political and economic turmoil often made it difficult to carry out his conservation goals. We learned, for example of his three year stint studying Rhesus monkeys in the Himalayan foothills of the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan, and the ordeal of traveling from one military check point to the next, the day after the 1977 military coup that ousted then President Ali Bhutto. We heard how his wife, along on the study and also a scientist, saved her husband from hyperthermia while trekking in the mountains. Somewhat closer to home, we learned of Dr. Melnick’s work in the Dominican Republic (a biodiversity hot spot) building latrines and water filtration systems in fishing communities, as well as his friendship and working relationship with President Leonel Fernandez Reyna.

Dr. Melnick and his colleagues are about to launch a huge sustainable fisheries program in that country. On a lighter note, and moving on to his work in conservation genetics in Indonesia, he described how if you rub the inside of a Sumatran rhino’s thigh it will most definitely roll over for a blood sample, and if you happen to rub the inside of the thigh of a Malayan tapir (we’re speaking here, in genetic terms, of the next closest species), it will gladly do the same.

Underpinning each of Dr. Melnick’s conservation goals is his firm belief that ecological restoration, in order to be successful, must be linked to the economic, educational and social well being of local populations. Conservations projects, that is, must revolve around relationships with community leaders, and local citizens must be the beneficiaries of such projects.

Dr. Melnick’s talk was part of Columbia University’s “Café Science” series, while also a celebration of the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species”, and the two hundredth anniversary of Darwin’s birth. This inspiring hour ended too quickly, and an eager band of audience members spilled onto the sidewalk and surrounded Dr. Melnick, hoping to ask him just a few more lingering questions.

Benjamin Grow, the new conductor of the 92nd Street Y Youth Orchestra, and Fernand Brunschwig, Professor of Science Education and Physics at Empire State College and Teacher’s College, gave a lecture demonstration entitled “Mysteries of Science: The Physics of Music: A Hands-On Multimedia Exploration of the Known and Unknown” to a group of about 30 people, young and old, in a ground floor classroom at the 92nd Street Y, on Wednesday evening, May 13th. “Mysteries of Science” provided a glimpse of an intensely abstract world, where all musical sound is organized around various mathematical principles.

Mr. Grow and Professor Brunschwig introduced us to this complex universe by demonstrating how sound can be reduced to sine waves of various frequencies and amplitudes. The tuning fork was struck, and the audience watched as a simple, flat wave appeared on the computer screen. A tone played on the keyboard, however, resulted in a more dramatic, and varied sine wave, and one with a more distinct character. This lead to a discussion of overtones—those attendant notes that accompany the fundamental note-- and the idea that every musical instrument has a particular musical timbre or sound spectrum. The difference between the sound of a piano and a violin, say, depends not on the fundamental note, but on the particular intensity of the various overtones produced.

This was followed by a discussion of “Equal Temperament,” a subject that Professor Brunschwig readily admits is one of the more challenging and abstract ideas in music, an idea that “required thousands of years of effort and struggle, and it has some really devilish twists and turns.” Equal Temperament is a system of tuning whereby the step between any two adjacent notes in a scale is precisely equal, or has an identical frequency ratio, allowing a tune to move in and out of other keys, or to quote Benjamin Grow, to “visit other rooms in the mansion.”

Professor Brunschwig has long been interested in the link between physics and music, and has written and lectured extensively on the topic. But it’s a constant challenge, he remarked, to pull physicists and mathematicians into the world of sound and, conversely, to interest musicians in physics. Getting physicists to hear things, he says, is tricky. What is their response? “Give me numbers, please”! Musicians, in the meantime, when faced with numbers might say, “I can hear it. That’s enough for me.”

One of the real “mysteries” of the 92nd Street Y evening, was the way in which the two presenters, who barely knew each other but seemed like old friends, were able to create what felt like a powerful and seamless fabric between the mathematical world, on one side, and the musical world on the other. Professor Brunschwig, who has played music for most of his life, later acknowledged that, as his mathematical knowledge of sound develops, so does his appreciation for the aesthetic power and beauty of music. Here is a message from which even the most laid-back music listener might benefit.