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Dumb Ideas

Serving Up Life on the Rocks with a Twist
November 6, 2008
We’ve heard theories life arose in a primeval soup, around hot deep-sea vents, around volcanoes and other hot spots; why would anyone consider the origin of life in ice?  A scientist in Spain has suggested life may have started in ice.  The title to the Science Daily write-up finds this to be the ultimate divination: […]
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Education

What an Obama Presidency May Mean for Origin Science
November 5, 2008
Needless to say, the scientific institutions are thrilled that their favorite candidate won.  Editorials in both Nature and Science showed little objectivity about politics in the last few weeks.  Part of this is due to Obama’s promises to fund science heavily, including $150 billion to fight global warming with alternative energy (see Nature News).  Another […]
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Dumb Ideas

Darwin’s Prognosticators
November 4, 2008
Scientists at Rockefeller University think they can one-up Darwin.  According to Science Daily, they think they can predict evolution’s next best move.  Evolution is supposed to be aimless, so it is not clear how they think they can predict chance or decide what is best.  The dubious nature of their quest, however, is only exceeded […]
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Cell Biology

Biological Complexity Continues to Astound
November 3, 2008
There’s more going on in your thinking apparatus than you think.  New scientific discoveries continue to unfold new layers of complexity and control.  Here are a few examples: Meta-code:  Your body has codes directing codes.  Geneticists were initially dismayed to find only 20,000 to 30,000 genes in the human genome.  “We were expecting that something […]
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Amazing Facts

Solar System Surprises
November 2, 2008
In the last few days and weeks, more amazing discoveries were made about bodies in the solar system. Mercury:  Results from the second flyby of Mercury on Oct. 6 by MESSENGER were announced Oct 29.  This pass covered more “hidden” territory that had never been seen before, bringing the coverage to 95%.  According to Space.com […]
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Cosmology

Antimatter Or Anti-Consensus?
November 1, 2008
Where’s the antimatter?  If the universe began in a big bang, there should be equal amounts of matter and antimatter.  Instead, there is only regular matter as far as our telescopes can see.  (If antimatter were present, the annihilation of antimatter and matter would give a characteristic gamma-ray signature.)  This is a big matter; the […]
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Amazing Facts

Paley’s Watch Found in Bacteria
October 31, 2008
A clock with cogs, gears and ratchets that keeps accurate time – what more could William Paley wish for?  The 18th century natural theologian used the illustration of stumbling upon a watch in a heath as an example of reasoning from design to a Designer – as from watch to watchmaker.  Skeptics like David Hume […]
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Dumb Ideas

FrankenTitan Comes to Life
October 30, 2008
There’s electricity at Titan, the large moon of Saturn.  That can only mean one thing: life!  “Electricity Found on Saturn Moon–Could It Spark Life?” asked a headline on National Geographic News by Rebecca Carroll.  Visions of spark discharge tubes in a mad scientist’s lab arise in the imagination.  “Recently identified electrical activity on Saturn’s largest […]
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Early Man

Scientific Terms Can Obfuscate, Not Enlighten
October 29, 2008
When scientists classify things and use scientific terms, are they really shedding light on nature and natural history?  It’s possible they may just be glossing over their own ignorance, suggested three articles in Nature last week.  They underscore cases where subjective human conventions are falsely assumed to correlate with external realities.  They lead us to […]
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Education

Darwin Myths Debunked – By Darwinist
October 28, 2008
An aura of legend has enveloped the memory of Charles Darwin.  To many, the white-bearded father of evolutionary theory was like a saint on a white horse, rescuing science from an age of superstition.  The true history is much more interesting.     Darwin Day is coming next February 12.  It marks Darwin’s 200th birthday […]
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Dinosaurs

Monster Mash
October 28, 2008
Just before Halloween, it’s time for tricks and treats about monsters in the fossil record.  Here’s a list of recent stories about scary beasts: Dino Dance:  Are these potholes tracks or weathering marks?  PhysOrg and Science Daily were among news outlets reporting a new interpretation of formations by a grad student at the University of […]
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Uncategorized

Bible Was Right: Edom Thrived in Solomon’s Time
October 27, 2008
High-precision radiocarbon dates have confirmed that Biblical Edom was active with industrial-scale metal production in the 10th and 9th centuries.  Archaeologists publishing in PNAS said,1 “The methodologies applied to the historical IA archaeology of the Levant have implications for other parts of the world where sacred and historical texts interface with the material record.”  In […]
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Solar System

Habitable Zones Are Not Forever
October 27, 2008
A new realization has broken on the astrobiological community: planetary habitable zones have no fences.  Michael Sherber wrote for Astrobiology Magazine (see Space.com) that planets around low-mass stars tend to be pulled out of the habitable zone toward the star.  They have just a billion years before migration can pull them in and cook them.  […]
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Amazing Facts

Snails Walk on Water
October 27, 2008
Why is that scientist staring at a snail?  He’s watching a miracle: walking on water.  This is not our exaggeration: Matt Kaplan on National Geographic News entitled his article, “How Snails Walk on Water Is a Small Miracle.”  If we can figure out the trick, we might be able to make little robots do it […]
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Human Body

Evolutionizing Religion: Who’s Assuming What?
October 26, 2008
“Findings from cognitive psychology, neuroscience, cultural anthropology and archaeology promise to change our view of religion,” said Pascal Boyer in Nature.1  His essay summarized studies that offer an evolutionary explanation for mankind’s propensity to embrace religion.  “We can probe the shared assumptions that religions are built on, however disparate, and examine the connection between religion […]
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