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Woodpecker Heads Absorb Shocks
January 9, 2007
Pounding a tree with your head 12,000 times a day would tend to give one a headache, but for woodpeckers, it’s all in a day’s work. How do they manage? Corey Binns on Live Science interviewed Ivan Schwab (UC Davis) who explained some of the specialized adaptations in a woodpecker head: thick muscles, spring-like bones, […]
Mars Life With Bleached Hair
January 8, 2007
Mars has hydrogen peroxide. Bombardier beetles use peroxide. So maybe the Viking landers in 1976 didn’t find life, because they didn’t look for peroxide-based life. That’s the essence of the reasoning in an Associated Press story circulating on the net (see Breitbart.com). Reporter Seth Borenstein earns Stupid Evolution Quote of the Week for […]
Is Legal Hammerlocking the Way to Win a Scientific Controversy?
January 6, 2007
The cartoon stereotype of a scientist as an unbiased truth-seeking nerd wearing a white lab coat is hard to reconcile with some recent events. Not that the cartoon stereotype was ever realistic, but the row over Darwinism vs Intelligent Design (ID) shows just how biased and unethical certain people and organizations can behave in support […]
Are Cellular Motors Related by Evolution?
January 5, 2007
Just because two things go round and round, does that make them related by common ancestry? A Japanese team thinks so. A bacterial flagellum rotates (06/04/2002). So does ATP synthase, though it is about 10 times smaller (04/30/2004). Publishing in PNAS,1 these researchers looked for a relationship, and noted that these two motors bear some […]
SETI: A Systematic Theology
January 4, 2007
Thick books on systematic theology usually include sections about creation, anthropology, and eschatology. Those sections are also present in condensed form in an article by Adrian Brown of the SETI Institute at Space.com. As for origins, Darwinian materialism was implicit passim and needed no elaboration. As for anthropology, he said man is like a god, […]
Article: What Hath Galileo Wrought?
January 4, 2007
For the PhysicsWeb site, philosopher and historian Robert B. Crease (State U of NY at Stony Brook) wrote a “Critical Point” article called “The Book of Nature.” He discusses Galileo’s contention that there is a Book of Nature separate from the Book of Scripture that can be investigated on its own through the language of […]
This Bacterium Moves Like a Tank
January 3, 2007
Mark McBride (U of Wisconsin) has been trying for a decade to figure out how a gliding bacterium glides. His conclusion: the microbe has tire treads like a conveyor belt that make it roll over a variety of surfaces, like an all-terrain vehicle. According to a U of Wisconsin press release, the Department […]
Precambrian Pods Promoted to Pleistocene (!)
January 3, 2007
The bulletin of the Geological Society of America started 2007 with a bang. (Geeks sometimes refer to the exclamation point as a “bang”.) It’s not often one sees an exclamation point in the title of a scientific paper, but the bang in one by Donald R. Lowe (Stanford) and Gary R. Byerly (Louisiana State)1 conveys […]
Human Endurance: Is It Evolutionary?
January 2, 2007
Some people are gluttons for punishment. Many a couch potato is probably content to watch an Ironman or Ultramarathon on HDTV from a recliner, but the ones who take part in the grueling endurance contests gaining popularity illustrate some human capabilities scientists are only beginning to understand. Nature1 described one called the Primal Quest adventure […]
In Science and Politics, Expect the Unexpected
December 29, 2006
Two findings reported this month illustrate how science changes. Paradigms and policies can have their scientific underpinnings yanked out from under them, causing both consternation and opportunities for new ways of thinking. Bring back the acid rain: Pick your poison: acid rain or global warming. Acid rain was the bogeyman of the 1980s, leading to […]
Cell Zippers, Linemen and Editors Put on a Show
December 28, 2006
The golden age of cell biology continues. Scientists keep unlocking the secrets of cellular machinery with newer and better techniques. With the curtain rising on a show we could not previously imagine, played out on a stage so small it took centuries of scientific work to even see it, biochemists are discovering amazing tricks that […]
Insects Pester Darwinian Story
December 27, 2006
It’s enough to bug any Darwinian: where did the insects come from? Here are some problems right off the bat sonar: Insects are fantastically diverse. Insects are among the most successful animals. There are no insect fossils earlier than the Devonian (evolutionary date: 410 million years ago). The earliest segmented body plans appeared in the […]
Incredible Stasis in Evolution: What Does It Mean?
December 26, 2006
Quite often in phylogenetic research, evolutionists find examples of extreme conservation of genes or traits. How they explain the lack of change is almost as interesting as the phenomenon itself. Here are two recent examples. Your cousin the shark: Surprise: you have more in common with horn sharks than bony fishes do. Craig Venter’s international […]
Danes Found the Keys to Happiness
December 24, 2006
According to the British Medical Journal, reported EurekAlert, British scientists wanted to find out what makes the Danish so darn happy. “Their hypotheses range from the unlikely (hair colour, genes, food and language) to the more plausible, such as family life, health and a prosperous economy.” Their conclusion? Danes are happier than other Europeans because […]
How Your Brain Conducts Itself at Attention
December 22, 2006
The conductor taps the stand. All the musicians, who had been warming up or conversing with neighbors, suddenly hush and rivet their attention on the conductor. The downbeat comes, and a marvel of coordination comes to life, each skilled player contributing to a unified yet diverse exhibition of harmonious sound. Something like that […]
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