MARTIN ZAHN
Biology Department, Thomas Nelson Community College
"The universe is not only queerer than we imagine, it's queerer than we can imagine."
J. B. S. Haldane
"Beyond a critical point within finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers increase. This is as true of humans in the finite space of a planetary ecosystem as it is of gas molecules in a sealed flask. The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who do survive."
Pardot Kynes in Frank Herbert's Dune
"...we can say that Maud 'Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult."
Frank Herbert, Dune
"The inhumanity of science concerns me, as when I am tempted to kill a rare snake that I may ascertain its species. I feel that this is not the means of acquiring true knowledge."
Loren Eisley, The Lost Notebooks
"The door to the past is a strange door. It swings open and things pass through it, but they pass in one direction only. No man can return across that threshold, though he can look down still and see the green light waver in the water weeds."
Loren Eisley, The Immense Journey
"Written deep in the human subconscious is a simple terror of what has come with us from the forest and sometimes haunts our dreams."
Loren Eisley, The Invisible Pyramid
"To the day of our deaths we exist in an inner solitude that is linked to the nature of life itself. Even as we project an affectation upon others we endure a loneliness which is the price of all individual consciousness."
Loren Eisley, The Invisible Pyramid
For more quotes from Loren Eisley's nature writings, go to The Man From The Sunflower Forest.
COURSES TAUGHT
On Campus
I teach a variety of
courses each semester including BIO 101,
BIO 102, BIO 141, BIO 142, and BIO 150
Students should see Blackboard Site for each course
NOTE: I will no longer be doing this online course after the Spring 2009
semester. This link has been removed.
Interested in regional weather--check the image below.
MERLOT PROJECT
This project is an attempt to identify quality educational "objects" on the World Wide Web that can be used as modules by any faculty. The sites are identified by being recommended by working faculty. They are then peer reviewed so that faculty looking for sites can have an idea of the quality and usefulness and not have to wade through the endless list that most searches give. Faculty can also join MERLOT for free and provide user reviews of sites listed on MERLOT by going to this MERLOT link. This is a highly ambitious project.
GENERAL INTERESTS
Spiders
Freshwater
Algae
Natural
History of Wetlands
Babylon 5
Trains
Cats
Curriculum
CCITT PROJECT
The Community Colleges for Innovative Technology Transfer (CCITT) project involves a series of curricula which will be found at the consortium's web site. I helped to develop a curriculum module on nuclear waste storage and risk analysis of a release
of radioactive materials from a nuclear power or storage facility. It includes background information and references, links to information available on the internet, and maps that can be used as is or entered into a geographic information system (GIS) for more complete analysis.
