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If you’re prospecting for new drugs in nature – which scientists continue to do, with or without the genome – there’s no better place to start than the business end of a good poisonous plant or animal. Modern medicine is filled with drugs derived from deadly poisons, from the muscle relaxant curare (taken from South American vines that are used to poison arrow tips) to the anticoagulant Aggrastat (based on the venom of the saw-scaled viper).

Share Read Later (2 of 2) "He will write books on the new idea of God to suit the way people live; induce faith in astrology so as to make not the will, but the stars, responsible for sins; he will explain guilt away psychologically as repressed sex, make men shrink in shame if their fellow men say they are not broad-minded and liberal ; he will identify tolerance with indifference to right and wrong, truth and error; he will spread the lie that men will never be better until they make society better and thus have selfishness to provide fuel for the next revolution ; he will foster science but only to have armament makers use one marvel of science to destroy another; he will foster more divorces under the disguise that another partner is 'vital'; he will invoke religion to destroy religion; he will even speak of Christ and say that he was the greatest man who ever lived; his mission, he will say, will be to liberate men from the servitudes of superstition and Fascism, which he will never define.

David Cannon / Getty ImagesA lizard basking in the hot sun A new study by the Zoological Society of London has found that 19% — nearly one in five — of the world’s 10,000 species of reptiles are threatened with extinction. The study, which has been printed in the journal Biological Conservation, was carried out by more than 200 experts who assessed the risk of extinction of 1,500 reptiles selected at random from around the globe.

Fifteen years ago, Judd Apatow and Paul Feig created a show about ’80s-era high school burnouts and nerds; the show starred Seth Rogen, James Franco, Jason Segel and Linda Cardellini. Sounds like a can’t-miss hit, right? And yet, to the chagrin of the show’s cult following, Freaks and Geeks was canceled after only one season. Though the show’s stars and creators went on to successful movie and TV careers, they — like the fans — never quite got over the decision to drop the show.