Chapter 2: Getting A Grip

Even thought I felt this chapter was not as interesting as the first, I still found some key points in the chapter itself that were very interesting. When Mr. Shubin described the dissecting of the cadaver, I thought of how cool it would be to see the whole anatomy of the human hand as Neil described it. It would be fascinating to see all of the numerous small bones come together to form the tool we most commonly use today and the symbol of a human at work.

In addition to the descriptions of dissecting the cadaver, I also found it interesting how the fin bones of the decrepit fish from so long ago could somehow relate to a human wrist/hand. And a fish doing push-ups? Really?? It never ever crossed my mind that a fish would have the capability of doing push ups, except maybe in like Spongebob or something. Next thing you know, starfish are going to be lifting weights..

Overall, I thought the chapter was fairly interesting, and the allusions to ancient fish anatomy really caught my eye and helped me better understand our skeletal past and how we were very similar to fish at one time.

Devin Larscheid