An Inconvenient Frogsicle Real frogs behave differently. —Paul Krugman Toss them in 100°C water—they frog-leap out. But gradually increase heat, at rate less than .2°C per minute, and dull-witted amphibians dreamily croak off to Elysium lilypads— or so the story goes, according to Sedgwick, in On the Variation of Reflex Excitability in the Frog induced by changes of Temperature (1882). La grenouille bouillie has been variously applied, during the Cold War, to relations with the Soviet Union, by survivalists—at the impending collapse of civilization— over inaction to climate change, ribbited by Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, to…
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