Blog – Page 365

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How the Animals Learned to Count

July 6, 2009

Any evolutionary article that begins with “How…” should be checked for Kipling-style just-so storytelling. Characteristics to watch for include (1) fanciful speculation without evidence: i.e., “made-up” tales that provide an answer to a childish question without appeal to rigorous proof, and (2) statements made with dogmatic authority, like a parent would explain to a child […]

Dumb Ideas

Paper View: Darwin, of All the Nerve

July 4, 2009

American neurons are due to get a workout this day. The taste buds and olfactory neurons will get their exercise first at Independence Day barbecues across the land, then the visual cortex and auditory neurons will max out as the fireworks start after dark. Escorted by the Editors of Science Magazine, Darwin is here in […]

Uncategorized

Divining Plant Evolution from Uncooperative Data

July 3, 2009

A new book on plant evolution came out. How well does it do explaining the diversity of the world’s plants via Darwin’s theory of natural selection? The answer depends on how forgiving you can be with details that don’t fit very well. The book is Paleobotany The Biology and Evolution of Fossil Plants. […]

Mammals

Animals Are Not Malthusians

July 2, 2009

According to Malthus and Darwin, the struggle to survive favors those who have the most fitness to take advantage of limited resources. A study by the Research Institute of Wildlife Ecology in Vienna, reported by PhysOrg shows this is not the case: Charles Darwin and his contemporaries postulated that food consumption in birds and mammals […]

Dinosaurs

Dakota Dino Reveals Skin Cells

July 1, 2009

“Absolutely amazing” and “absolutely gobsmacking” are exclamations made by scientists analyzing the fossilized skin of a hadrosaur.

Fossils

The Elephant Explosion

June 30, 2009

The title is not intended to suggest pieces of pachyderm flying all over the place, but rather one paleontologist’s theory about the rapid pace of elephant evolution 60 million years ago. He bases his ideas on a small fossil he found in Morocco. According to him, the primitive ancestor of all elephants (order Proboscidea) lived […]

Amazing Facts

Warning: Do NOT Mutate This Protein Complex

June 30, 2009

In each cell of your body there is a complex of 8 or more proteins bound together called the BBSome. This protein complex, discovered in 2007, should not be disturbed. Here’s what happens when it mutates: “A homozygous mutation in any BBSome subunit (except BBIP10) will make you blind, obese and deaf, will obliterate your […]

Amazing Facts

How Cells Proofread DNA Is Still Mysterious

June 29, 2009

An amazing fact about DNA transcription is that the machinery not only copies DNA onto RNA, but checks it for errors. A story in Science Daily says that researchers would expect 100 times more errors statistically than the actual results of transcription in the cell. One of the mechanisms revealed in more detail […]

Amazing Facts

Computer Programmers Borrow Eye Technology

June 28, 2009

Computer processing of video images may become twice as accurate with 10 times the speed of earlier models, thanks to what scientists are imitating in the human eye. “The linear solution to one of the most vexing challenges to advancing computer vision has direct applications in the fields of action and object recognition, surveillance, wide-base […]

Darwin and Evolution

Bio-Darwinist Beats Up On Psycho-Darwinists

June 26, 2009

Evolution of rape? No way. Sharon Begley won’t let the evolutionary psychologists get away with their tales about how rapists, molesters, and cheaters can’t help themselves because evolution made them that way. The Science Magazine blog Origins seems to be cheering her on. Science writer Sharon Begley, who in 2007 returned to her old job […]

Media

Science Reporters Need to Bark More

June 25, 2009

“Cheerleader or watchdog?” That’s the title of this week’s editorial in Nature1 opening a feature on science journalism. Science reporters are an aid to scientists, the editors said, but not just when they convey their findings to the public or help shape public understanding on matters of policy. They are also an aid when they […]

Media

Salting News with the L Word Life

June 25, 2009

Small amounts of sodium were detected in ice particles erupting from Saturn’s moon Enceladus. Deduction: this might lower the melting point of underground ice, forming subsurface pockets of liquid water – perhaps an ocean. Conclusion: Life! It doesn’t matter that Enceladus has no other factors conducive to life than water, or that salt is generally […]

Uncategorized

Raising a Titanic Geological Plateau

June 24, 2009

The Colorado Plateau is a huge region covering parts of four states. It’s over a mile higher than its surroundings, but its layers are remarkably flat. How did this region, littered with marine fossils, rise into the sky? Three American scientists writing in Nature last week believe they have a mechanism:1 it heated from underneath […]

Cosmology

We Know Less Than We Think

June 23, 2009

Strange reports come from science news outlets on occasion that call into question facts we thought we understood. These raise a question: do we really know what we think we know? Cutting dinosaurs down to size: Dinosaurs may have been half as heavy as thought, said Science Daily. Some paleontologists are claiming that widely-used methods […]

Darwin and Evolution

Leading Darwinists Pool Their Speculations

June 22, 2009

The Darwin Bicentennial continued this week with a series of articles in PNAS by leading Darwinists. The Sackler Colloquium, called “In the Light of Evolution III,” explored the history and impact of Darwin’s theory of evolution, and prospects for the future. The lead paper said, “Our intent in this Sackler Colloquium has not been to […]

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