Natural History Museum

On Thursday, the 25th of October, the Bucknell in London group had the special privledge of visiting the Natural History Museum. Seemingly unrelated to economics and physics, this fieldtrip was still very worthwhile in my opinion. I am fascinated by everything science, so needless to say I was like a kid in a candy shop going around and exploring all that the Natural History Museum had to offer.

While we were required to visit Darwin's statue near the cafe and the Lasting Impressions, Marine Invertebrates and Primates exhibitions, I explored many more such as the Dinosaur, the Mammal and the Evolution exhibitions. While most of them were very interesting and stimulating, I must say that the Dinosaur exhibition was by far my favorite. I'm not a dinosaur expert nor am I very passionate about these creatures, but the design and the plethora of information within this exhibit enraptured and delighted me. It was amazing to see actual fossils and bones of these prehistoric animals; they don't seem that big on paper but when there is a 10 foot tall by 5 foot wide femur bone next to you, one can realize their actual enormous size. I also found the dinosaur to human comparisons helpful to gauge their size. The lifesize model of the "teenage" T-Rex was amazing; it was so lifelike that I actually saw little children being comforted by their parents with the soothing words, "it's not real sweetheart don't worry." The Dinosaur exhibiton must be a lot of people's favorites or in the least be one of the most popular exhibitions as a huge line had been formed (with ropes and everything) by the time I was done touring it.

Among the other exhibitions I toured, I found the one on Evolution to be fascinating. I have long been a student of the theory of evolution so the exhibition on the topic was a welcome refresher and greatly appreciated. I enjoyed viewing the comparisons of the skulls of the ancestors to the Homo sapiens species and also was intrigued by their history and location.

Being an Animal Behavior major and mainly dealing with and interested in mammals, I was particularly taken by the Mammal Exhibition. It was amazing to look up to the ceiling and see the model of the blue whale span the entire length of it. I also enjoyed the design of this exhibition as it grouped mammals according to similarity and placed them in such a way that depicted their natural habitats and tendencies.

The Lasting Impressions exhibition was fabulous as well in its own respects. I am very intrigued by fossils and love to learn about the creation of and vast history of the formation of the Earth, so this exhibition fit the bill just perfectly. I also find it fascinating to learn how to calculate the age of something, such as the age of a whale by its teeth and the age of a Bezoar goat by its horns. This exhibition had really neat contents and was very intellectually stimulating.

I must say that I found the Marine Invertebrates exhibition to be rather boring and non-stimulating. It was basically just a hollow room with two glass cases containing replicas of or preserved invertebrates. It may be my general dislike of marine invertebrates that made me enjoy this exhibition the least, but I just found it to be not to par with the other exhibitions within the museum.

With all of the exhibitons I toured, I still would greatly enjoy going back to the Natural History Museum to tour new exhibitions as well as revisit the ones I went to on Thursday. I learned an incredible amount of information and had a great time doing so.