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Artificial Selection Is Not Natural Selection

August 16, 2007

From Nature1 comes this point to ponder: Evolution has crafted thousands of enzymes that are efficient catalysts for a plethora of reactions. Human attempts at enzyme design trail far behind, but may benefit from exploiting evolutionary tactics. The subheading summarized a commentary by Michael P. Robertson and William G. Scott (UC Santa Cruz) on “directed […]

Dumb Ideas

Stupid Evolution Quote of the Week: Shark Chefs and Finger Food

August 15, 2007

A press release from University of Florida wins this week’s prize for trying to make dogmatism funny (or at least appealing to snackers): When the first four-legged animals sprouted fingers and toes, they took an ancient genetic recipe and simply extended the cooking time, say University of Florida scientists writing in Wednesday’s issue of the […]

Amazing Facts

DNA Repair Is Highly Coordinated

August 14, 2007

The remarkable ability of cells to repair DNA damage has been the subject of several recent articles. As a long, physical molecule subject to perturbing forces, DNA is subject to breakage on occasion. If repair mechanisms were not in place, the genetic information would quickly become hopelessly scrambled and life would break down. Studies are […]

Dumb Ideas

Weird-Science Origin-of-Life Theories

August 10, 2007

Two news articles on the origin of life seem bizarre at best. One even used the word “bizarrely” in its own self-evaluation. Living dust: Zap the dust in your living room and it may come alive. Is that the gist of this story in PhysOrg? A team of international scientists thinks that cosmic dust in […]

Dumb Ideas

The World Is a Free Lunch

August 7, 2007

One of the strangest Darwinian models to be put forth recently has to be a paper by James V. Stone (a psychologist at Sheffield U, UK), published in PLoS Computational Biology.1 He basically says that evolution is a free lunch. Brains and whole body types can emerge if an organism can learn parts of adaptive […]

Dumb Ideas

Darwinism Seen in Action!

August 3, 2007

An example of Darwinian evolution in action was reported by EurekAlert. This dramatic announcement called it a “rare example” of a “controversial theory of genetic conflict” in the reproduction of certain fish: The conflict has been likened to a “battle of the sexes” or an “arms race” at the molecular level between mothers and fathers. […]

Amazing Facts

Motorized Ears Give Mammals Acoustic Acuity

July 31, 2007

f=”crev03.htm#amazing11″>03/27/2001), we reported on the discovery of prestin, a motor protein that acts as an amplifier in the inner ear. One of the fastest-acting molecular motors known (02/21/2002), prestin works by stiffening the rod-shaped cell body with its cilia. Somehow, the action of this motor protein amplifies hearing in mammalian ears by several orders of […]

Dumb Ideas

The Simpsons Producer Treats Evolution as Fact

July 26, 2007

The TV cartoon The Simpsons was praised for its “greatness” in, of all places, the premiere scientific journal Nature.1 Michael Hopkin interviewed “Executive producer Al Jean, the show’s head writer and a Harvard mathematics graduate.” One of the questions was, “One episode in which the show does take sides is the one in which Lisa […]

Amazing Facts

Mosquitos Are Water-Walking Champions

July 18, 2007

We hate ’em, but in one sense we should admire them: mosquitos are the water-walking champions of the animal kingdom. They even beat out water striders, reported Live Science and EurekAlert based on research from Physical Review E. Science Daily wrote of “miraculous mosquito legs” and had a picture of the intricate fan-shaped superhydrophobic structures […]

Dumb Ideas

News Reporters Knuckling Under to Darwinian Storytelling

July 17, 2007

The science news media are virtually going ape over a claim about how chimpanzees might have evolved into upright-walking humans: what is going on? It began with a paper in PNAS.1 Sockol, Raichlen and Pontzer measured the gaits of chimpanzees and humans and concluded that it is more efficient to walk upright than to propel […]

Amazing Facts

Cool Cell Tricks

July 16, 2007

Some cell parts act like acrobats, some like rescue workers, and some like I.T. professionals. Here are some recent stories about the tricks that living cells perform each day. Precision formation flying: The Scientist expressed amazement at the precision of key factors in development of the body plan in fruit flies. The levels of expression […]

Amazing Facts

Roadrunner and Largest Flying Bird Described from Fossils

July 15, 2007

A bird with a 23-foot wingspan was described in the BBC News. At an estimated 155 pounds, this bird probably had to jump from a height to get airborne and likely rode on thermals. The article says the bird rivalled in size some light airplanes. A diagram shows the Argentinean giant with wings upwardly stretched […]

Mammals

Elephant Trunk Inspires Robot Arm

July 9, 2007

Scientists are trying to imitate the smooth, supple movements of an elephant's trunk.

Cosmology

Nature Celebrates Bizarre ‘Many-Worlds’ Cosmology

July 7, 2007

The cover of Nature this week (July 7) looks like a comic book.

Amazing Facts

Mother-of-Pearl Inspires Materials Science

July 5, 2007

It’s not only beautiful, it’s strong. EurekAlert described how scientists are intrigued by mother-of-pearl, also called nacre, because of its strength: you can drive a truck over it and it will not break. It is 3,000 times more resistant to fracture than the aragonite from which the oyster makes it. 95% of it self-assembles in […]

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