On Friday, May 31, 2013, The Staten Island Museum had a program in conjunction with the World Science Festival: The Joy of Six Legged Sex about how insects and humans attract their mates.
The Joy of Six-legged Sex: An Evening of Insect Courtship and Cocktails
Join a unique night of cocktails, courtship, and conversation with
leading experts about how insects and humans attract their mates. The
fun begins aboard the Staten Island Ferry as we cruise through New York
Harbor at sunset, and continues when we arrive at the Staten Island
Museum for insect-inspired cocktails and an after-hours talk and tour of
the museum’s cicada collection, the largest in North America. Explore
the strange and innovative mating strategies of the insect world—from
flashy displays to arresting scents to symphonies of sound—along with
some surprising parallels to human behavior. Outside, a DJ spins and
insects swarm around Brandon Ballengee’s new light sculpture and insect
observatory, “Love Motel For Insects.”
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| Moderator Cara Santa Maria (left) introduces Marlene Zuk (center), author, biologist & writer, and Helen Fisher (right), an anthropologist to the attendees of the program. |
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| John Cooley (center), an Environmental Scientist, tries to get a Magicicada cassini to sing. With Cara Santa Maria (left) & Edward Johnson (right) |
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| Magicicada cassini |
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| John Cooley singing to Magicicada cassini |
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| John Cooley singing to Magicicada cassini |
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| John Cooley was able to get the Magicicada cassini to sing in all three Court Calls |
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| Display of Will Davis' equipment that he used to study cicada |
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| Edward Johnson and Elias Bonaros |
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| Cicada Memorabilia on display at the Staten Island Museum |
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| John Cooley, Elias Bonaros and David Rothenberg |
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| Elias Bonaros showing visitors a Magicicada cassini Cicada |
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| Cicada Jewelry |
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| Cicada Art |
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John Cooley
Environmental Scientist
John Cooley grew up fascinated by the natural world in general
and cicadas in particular. He spent a number of years studying flies in
high alpine meadows of Colorado and exploring the mountains of the Front
Range. As a doctoral student, Cooley was the co-discoverer of a
previously unknown female signal in periodical cicadas, and that
discovery also helped lead Cooley and his colleagues to find a
previously unknown cryptic periodical cicada species. Cooley has
traveled extensively in North America, New Zealand, and Australia, and
he has taught at Yale University, Ohio State University, University of
Connecticut, and University of Rhode Island. Cooley is currently
teaching and conducting research at University of Connecticut, where he
leads a project to use data from citizen scientists to guide species
distribution mapping efforts. Because several degrees is never enough,
Cooley is also an M.B.A. candidate working to bridge scientific and
economic discussions of resource use and sustainability.
Helen Fisher
Anthropologist
Helen Fisher is a biological anthropologist at Rutgers
University. She studies the evolution, brain systems (fMRI) and
biological patterns of romantic love, mate choice, marriage, gender
differences, personality, and the biology of leadership styles. She has
written five internationally best selling books, including Why Him? Why Her?, Why We Love, and Anatomy of Love.
She is currently the chief scientific advisor to Match.com and
subsidiary, Chemistry.com, where she designed the Chemistry.com
questionnaire now taken by 13 million people in 40 countries. She
lectures worldwide, including lectures at the World Economic Forum
(Davos), 2012 international meeting of the G-20, National Academy of
Sciences, The Economist, TED, United Nations, Smithsonian Institution,
Salk Institute and Harvard Medical School. She publishes widely in
academic journals and appears regularly on TV, radio, and print media.
Marlene Zuk
Author, Biologist, Professor
Marlene Zuk is a biologist and writer who is interested in sex,
evolution, and behavior. She is especially interested in the ways that
parasites and disease influence those issues. Her current research
focuses on rapid evolution and mating behavior in field crickets that
live in Hawaii, though most of the work, alas, takes place in the
laboratory. More generally, she is interested in the ways that people
use animal behavior to think about human behavior, and vice versa. This
means that she gets asked a lot of interesting questions from the
general public, ranging from whether adultery or homosexuality are
natural, to why people’s pets do the things they do. Her quick answer is
“Yes, although it also depends on what you mean by ‘natural,’ and I
have no idea.”
Cara Santa Maria
Science Journalist
Cara Santa Maria has dedicated her life to improving science
literacy by communicating scientific principles across media platforms. A
North Texas native, she currently lives in Los Angeles. Prior to moving
to the west coast, Santa Maria taught biology and psychology courses to
university undergraduates and high school students in Texas and New
York. Her published research has spanned various topics, including
clinical psychological assessment, the neuropsychology of blindness,
neuronal cell culture techniques, and computational neurophysiology.
Santa Maria previously worked as the senior science correspondent for The Huffington Post, where she wrote, produced, and hosted a weekly video series called Talk Nerdy To Me. She also co-stars in Hacking The Planet and The Truth About Twisters on The Weather Channel.
Join a unique night of cocktails, courtship, and conversation with
leading experts about how insects and humans attract their mates. The
fun begins aboard the Staten Island Ferry as we cruise through New York
Harbor at sunset, and continues when we arrive at the Staten Island
Museum for insect-inspired cocktails and an after-hours talk and tour of
the museum’s cicada collection, the largest in North America. Explore
the strange and innovative mating strategies of the insect world—from
flashy displays to arresting scents to symphonies of sound—along with
some surprising parallels to human behavior. Outside, a DJ spins and
insects swarm around Brandon Ballengee’s new light sculpture and insect
observatory, “Love Motel For Insects.” 
