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Did Early Islam Promote Science?

December 16, 2004

Nature published a news feature this week crediting a religion, Islam, with advancing science, but saying nothing about the Christian roots of science.1 It begins, Western science owes much to Islam’s golden age – a debt that is often forgotten. To help redress the balance, Fuat Sezgin has reconstructed a host of scientific treasures using […]

Dinosaurs

Cretaceous Temperature Estimates Point Out Flaws in Climate Models

December 15, 2004

Nature1 this week described evidence for high temperatures in the Arctic during the Cretaceous that it termed “astounding.” Based on work by Jenkins et al. that Arctic waters were 15°C, as warm as modern coastal waters off France and Maryland. For a region blanketed in darkness for half of the year, the Arctic Ocean was […]

Uncategorized

Late Bloomer Galaxy Just Now Getting Into Star Formation?

December 15, 2004

According to a story in New Scientist, a “young” galaxy is just now starting its process of star formation. Most galaxies formed more than 10 billion years ago. Those born later tend to be fashioned from recycled gas rich in metals that were forged by previous generations of stars. But astronomers Trinh Thuan of the […]

Dumb Ideas

Did Martians Win the War of the Worlds?

December 14, 2004

In the H.G. Wells version, the Martian invaders with their tripod machines and death rays, wreaking havoc on Earth, were defeated by Earth bacteria. The new scientific plot envisioned by scientists, reported on Space.com, is that the Martians had the bacteria, and invaded Earth with it to either conquer Earth life or spread it onto […]

Intelligent Design

Debate: Should Schools Teach the Controversy Over Darwinism?

December 14, 2004

The San Francisco Chronicle published a written debate between Stanford evolutionist Robert Sapolsky and Discovery Institute fellows Stephen Meyer and John Angus Campbell. The subject is whether schools should “teach the controversy” over evolution. Both articles can be read on the Discovery Institute website. Meanwhile, the ACLU is suing another school district, this […]

Health

For Better Workouts, Head for the Hills

December 14, 2004

Science News1 reported on a study by the American Heart Association that shows hiking in the mountains is good for you. Experiments on people hiking in the Austrian Alps showed that going uphill, the body improves the processing of fats called triglycerides, and walking downhill improves the processing of glucose sugar. 45 volunteers who were […]

Darwin and Evolution

Introducing the Stretch & Squish Theory of Evolution

December 14, 2004

How do you squish an arm into a wing, or stretch a fin into a leg? This sounds like the silly putty theory of evolution.

Solar System

Cassini Passes Titan a Third Time

December 13, 2004

Raw images from Cassini’s Titan-b flyover from 750 miles (see animation) have been uploaded to the website: Cassini Raw Images (proceed from this link). Improved, processed images are now being posted at saturn.jpl.nasa.gov, such as this high resolution of dark terrain. Look also at JPL the and Cassini Imaging Team websites. In addition, teams monitoring […]

Human Body

Monkeys Have No Ear for Music

December 13, 2004

Consonance and dissonance have no meaning to monkeys, studies have shown. Nature Science Update reported on experiments on cotton-top tamarins showing that, unlike humans, they do not find consonant tones more pleasing than dissonant ones. “If you want to look at the evolution of music it’s important to do these types of studies,” says Laurel […]

Uncategorized

Gene Deserts Not All Dead

December 10, 2004

Researchers continue to find evidence for function in the so-called “gene deserts” (stretches of DNA that do not code for genes) but are not yet ready to give up the concept of “junk DNA” entirely. According to EurekAlert, scientists at Lawrence Livermore found that the highly-conserved sections tend to contain regulatory agents, but they assume […]

Intelligent Design

Intelligent Design Evidence Convinces Atheist of Designer

December 9, 2004

According to an AP report on ABC News, a famous British atheist now believes in God based on scientific evidence. “At age 81, after decades of insisting belief is a mistake, Antony Flew has concluded that some sort of intelligence or first cause must have created the universe. A super-intelligence is the only good explanation […]

Amazing Facts

Now We Know How Birds Fly

December 9, 2004

Elementary physical science students know how airplane wings generate lift, but bird flight poses special challenges. The aptly-named swifts, for instance, can practically turn on a dime, dive steeply, and halt in mid-air to catch insects in ways that make a stunt pilot stall. It’s not just flapping, and it’s not just leading-edge feather shape, […]

Uncategorized

Chicken, Silkworm Genomes Published

December 9, 2004

Now that the chicken genome has made the cover of Nature1 and the silkworm genome has been published in Science2 this week, evolutionists are busily mining the data for clues to evolutionary ancestry of very disparate groups of animals, says EurekAlert (also here and here). For example, in the paper on the silkworm genome, the […]

Birds

Crows and Apes Related by Convergent Evolution

December 9, 2004

Scientists have noticed that crows have some of the same tool-making skills as apes, and in fact, are even better tool makers. How could such vastly different animals show such similar mental skills? Science1 explains this as another example of convergent evolution: Discussions of the evolution of intelligence have focused on monkeys and apes because […]

Intelligent Design

Nature Takes Note of Religious Influence

December 9, 2004

The surprisingly strong show of support for moral issues in the recent U.S. election has been the talk of the news for weeks now, and Big Science can’t ignore it. “The voices of religion are more prominent and influential than they have been for many decades,” begins a prominent editorial in Nature1 Dec. 9, entitled […]

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