For April Fool’s Day, we talk about a famous joke in the history of biology. Dr Rebecca Martin interviews Professor Joe Cain about the Snouters. It’s a joke that began with publication of a book in 1961 that told the story of an unusual group of mammals discovered on a remote archipelago in the Pacific Ocean. It was a fiction; a prank; a joke. That joke took on a life of its own as other people retold the joke, embellished it, and translated it into new environments. Joe has done the historian’s job of tracing these paths. He’s also done the sociologist’s job of drawing a lesson about communities and tribes. “Jokes help groups draw boundaries,” he says. “They do social work, and they do intellectual work.” Joe talks about the project in this interview. He also talks more widely about science and technology studies and its value for interpreting s ...