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Chimpanzee Fossil Upsets Early Man Speciation Theory

September 1, 2005

Paleontologists need no longer lament the complete dearth of chimpanzee fossils. Nature announced the discovery of the first fossil chimpanzee teeth. The location, however – the Great Rift Valley in Africa – was unexpected. The discoverers, Sally McBrearty and Nina G. Jablonski,1 explain: There are thousands of fossils of hominins, but no fossil chimpanzee has […]

Early Man

Chimpanzee Genome Published: Is There a Monkey in Your Genes?

September 1, 2005

Nature’s cover story September 1 is about the publication of the chimpanzee genome. Evolutionists are digging through the data for evidence of human common ancestry. Have they found it? The results, as usual, are mixed: MSNBC News states the situation concisely: “Genome comparison reveals many similarities – and crucial differences.” Here is the gist of […]

Uncategorized

Briefly Noted

August 31, 2005

Human Body – You Smell Like a Dog: Bloodhounds, we know, are good at telling the direction of a scent, but it turns out that humans have that ability, too. Researchers at UC Berkeley did experiments with human subjects to see if they could tell which direction a scent came from. Functional MRI (fMRI) was […]

Intelligent Design

Darwin Debates Attract Rhetoricians, Some Pro, Some Not

August 31, 2005

Nothing like a controversy to get people talking. Some understand the issues and speak with skill and style; some just like to be part of the excitement. Here are samples from the war of the words over evolution: Connect the Dots: Having just read Richard Weikart’s From Darwin to Hitler (02/03/2005), Chuck Colson on BreakPoint […]

Physics

Marvelous Puzzle: Enceladus South Pole Surface Less Than 1,000 Years Old

August 30, 2005

Enceladus, a moon of Saturn smaller than the British isles (comparison image), has a region at the south pole that is less than 1,000 years old, and maybe only 10 years old. This conclusion, announced at Cassini science briefings in London August 30, is based on multi-instrument observations taken July 14 during the closest flyby […]

Education

Back to School, Front to Darwinism Debate

August 30, 2005

The national debate about how to teach origins in public schools continues to roil. Here are some recent developments: Poll: A new Pew Research Poll reported on MSNBC News found that 64% of Americans want creationism taught alongside evolutionism, and 38% favor teaching creation only. For details see the Pew Research press release which includes […]

Dumb Ideas

Do You Belong in the Zoo?

August 29, 2005

People are gawking at people in the London Zoo, each probably wondering what side of the cage they belong on. In one of the primate exhibits, eight scantily clad white people are on display, reports AP (see MSNBC and Yahoo). Wearing fig leaves pinned onto their swimsuits, they play, they scratch, they groom each other, […]

Cell Biology

Molecular Motors Galore: How Did They Evolve?

August 26, 2005

Myosin is one of the cell’s little monorail motors that trucks cargo around the cell, pushes false feet into the surrounding environment, forces packages out the cell membrane, makes muscles move and wiggles hairlike cilia. Scientists reporting in Nature1 found twice as many varieties of myosin (37) than were previously known (17) and decided to […]

Uncategorized

Do Fossil Counts Match Sediment Counts?

August 25, 2005

If evolution is true, the number of species coming and going should track the number of rock layers in which they are fossilized, at least roughly. The more sediments per unit time, the more new genera should arise within them. Shanan E. Peters (U of Michigan) decided to test this “novel” approach with marine fossils […]

Health

Looking for Ethical Alternatives to Embryonic Stem Cells

August 24, 2005

Pro-life advocates perked up their ears at the announcement of a new method that can produce stem cells without destroying embryos. National Geographic News and MSNBC News talked about the method, which uses skin cells and “reprograms” them to act like embryonic stem cells. Religion Journal thinks the ethical debate over stem cells may be […]

Birds

Darwins Finches Evolve Back and Forth

August 24, 2005

What’s new on the Galápagos? For those needing an update on Darwin’s famous finches, the researchers who have spent the most time studying them – Peter and Mary Grant (Princeton) – wrote a Quick Guide in Current Biology1 in question-and-answer format. We’ll skip the introductory material about how the birds got named after Darwin, and […]

Human Body

Your Brain Has Perfect Pitch

August 23, 2005

Scientists have a knack for asking questions about things most of us take for granted. “The whole orchestra tunes up to an A note from the oboe – but how do our brains tell that all the different sounds are the same pitch?” asks Robert J. Zatorre in Nature.1 This is a puzzling question to […]

Origin of Life

Origin of Life: How Dry I Am?

August 23, 2005

Stephen Benner (U of Florida) has stopped looking for life in water. A researcher into the evolutionary origin of life, he understands that “water is a terrible solvent for life” – not life as we know it today, he means, but life at the beginning. This sounds strange, considering most astrobiologists believe in a “follow […]

Early Man

Paleoanthropology: Start Over?

August 22, 2005

The September issue of National Geographic, featuring the African continent, has arrived in homes. On page 1, Joel Achenbach of the Washington Post wrote about the quest for early man, asking, “Are we looking for bones in all the right places?” The bulk of the article describes the “messy” story of human origins. It used […]