For over two centuries, the platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) has been constructed and categorized in multiple ways. An unprecedented mélange of anatomical features and physiological functions, it long remained a systematic quandary. Nevertheless, since 1797, naturalists and biologists have pursued two recurring obsessions. Investigations into platypus reproduction and lactation have focused attention largely upon females of the species. Despite its apparent admixture of avian, reptilian and mammalian characters, the platypus was soon placed as a rudimentary mammal – primitive, naïve and harmless. (...) This article pursues a different taxonomic trajectory, concentrating on a specifically male anatomical development: the crural spur and venom gland on the hind legs. Once the defining characteristic of both the platypus and echidna (Tachyglossus aculeatus), by 1830 this sexed spur had been largely dismissed as inactive and irrelevant. For a creature regularly depicted as a biological outlier, the systematic and evolutionary implications of platypus poison have remained largely overlooked. In Australia, however, sporadic cases of ‘spiking’ led to consistent homologies being remarked between the platypus crural system and the venom glands of snakes. As with its reproductive reliance upon eggs, possession of an endogenous poison suggested significant reptilian affinities, yet the platypus has rarely been classed as an advanced reptile. Indeed, ongoing uncertainty regarding the biological purpose of the male’s spur has ostensibly posed a directional puzzle. As with so many of its traits, however, platypus poison has been consistently described as a redundant remnant, rather than an emergent feature indicating evolutionary advance. (shrink)

The effects of distant, intercessory prayer on health outcomes have been studied in a range of randomised, blinded clinical trials. However, while seeking the evidentiary status accorded this ‘gold standard’ methodology, many prayer studies fall short of the requirements of the World Medical Association's Declaration of Helsinki for the ethical conduct of trials involving human subjects. Within a sample of 15 such studies published in the medical literature, many were found to have ignored or waived key ethical precepts, including adequate (...) standards of care, patient confidentiality and informed consent. Prayer was considered in most studies to pose negligible or no risk to subjects, despite the fact that no clear mechanism of action nor any safety monitoring procedures were described. As a result, many studies did not meet basic ethical standards required of clinical trials of biophysical interventions, making application of their results ethically problematic. If investigators wish their data to adequately inform the use or rejection of intercessory prayer to improve health, these shortcomings should be addressed in future studies. (shrink)