I recently read something in a book by Christopher Hitchens that surprised me: “We have only recently established that a cow is closer in family to a whale than to a horse: other wonders certainly await.” Whoa. What? I did not know that. Then I learned that baby whales and cows are both called calves. Of course, I got curious and explored further. Here’s what I found:

USA Today says

New fossil discoveries add weight to the conclusion that whales are related to land-based plant-eaters such as cows and hippopotamuses rather than to an extinct group of carnivores, two groups of researchers report.

This site I’ve never heard of says

In their study, the genes of about twenty animals were analyzed and retroposons common to cows, hippopotami and whales were found. Professor Okada says “Whales and hippopotami look quite different, but they have the same abilities to communicate by sound in the water.”

It also includes the following less-confusing-than-it-looks-diagram:

thecreationofanevolutionist.blogspot.com has an amusing, and potentially genuine, image:

The Sydney Morning Herald has a piece about crazy Japanese experiments:

A review of the controversial scientific research conducted by Japan and its whalers has uncovered a list of “bizarre” and useless experiments, including how to cross breed cows with whales.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought that whales and cows would both benefit SO much by having attributes of the other. I can’t be alone in this line of thinking.

If you’ve never seen this video, please do so. It’s an eye-opener, to say the least. It puts in perspective just how very tiny we are compared to other celestial bodies in our solar system, our galaxy and the universe.

An interesting book to read (even just the first few chapters, which is all I’ve read) is Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything. Here’s a snippet:

Crazy, huh? It’s important to stop and put things in perspective sometimes. We are very, very tiny.