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Bible and Theology

Who Should Teach Self-Control?
April 15, 2011
A symposium at Massey University in New Zealand has come up with a profound thought: self-control is a key to a happier life.  Academics have helped themselves to an ancient notion that teaching self-control to children leads to happier outcomes as adults.  Did the world need science to reach this conclusion?     Self-control is […]
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Darwin and Evolution

Teacher Protection Inflames Darwinist Outrage
April 11, 2011
Imagine a bill that protects teachers who wish to present facts – the facts about Darwinism.  Assume that it specifically forbids teaching creationism or intelligent design.  Imagine the bill seeking to increase critical thinking among students about controversial subjects.  Should it be a cause for alarm?     There’s actually a bill like that in […]
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Darwin and Evolution

Researchers Violate Separation of Science and State
April 8, 2011
What are the limits of science?  Many of us envision men and women in white lab coats holding test tubes, studying readouts on instruments, or hacking rocks with picks.  A look at headlines from science news sites, though, shows some scientists inserting their opinions in areas traditionally led by scholars in the humanities – and […]
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Cell Biology

Adult Stem Cell Advances Continue
April 7, 2011
The momentum for stem cell therapy is still on the side of adult stem cells (ASC), not embryonic stem cell (ESC) research.  Here are some recent findings: Blood vessel repair:  A press release from King’s College London says, “Scientists from King’s College London have uncovered the first genetic evidence that shows cells found on the […]
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Philosophy of Science

Assuming Reality: Can Crater Dating Be Tested?
April 3, 2011
Two astronomers in Paris have come up with a new crater chronology for the moon and offered it as a way to date other objects in the inner solar system.  Their paper in Icarus,1 however, assumes so many unobservable things, the reader may wonder if it talks about the true history of the moon or […]
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Dumb Ideas

Imagining Worlds: Is It Science?
April 2, 2011
An entry on Space.com is almost pure speculation with no observation.  Does it belong on a science news site?     Reporter Clara Moskowitz gave Viorel Badescu [Polytechnic University of Bucharest, Romania] free rein to imagine life on free-floating planets (FFPs) – bodies wandering free in space after being abandoned, like wayward children, from their […]
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Darwin and Evolution

Psychologist Analyzes ID Belief with Emotionally Loaded Poll
March 31, 2011
Without any critique, Science Daily and PhysOrg reproduced a bizarre press release from University of British Columbia that alleges, “Death anxiety prompts people to believe in intelligent design, reject evolution.”     A contrived psychological survey, replete with imagining one’s own death and then reading quotes from Michael Behe and Richard Dawkins, scared 1,674 respondents […]
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Fossils

Science Discovers the Unexpected and the Obvious
March 30, 2011
Young’s Law jokes, “All great discoveries are made by mistake.”  Here are some recent examples. Arch-istan:  Think the world’s natural features are all well known?  “Researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society have stumbled upon a geological colossus in a remote corner of Afghanistan: a natural stone arch spanning more than 200 feet across its base,” […]
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Darwin and Evolution

Scientists: Who Can You Believe?
March 29, 2011
Scientists form a kind of knowledge priesthood in our modern world, but when long-taught principles get overturned, it raises questions on what scientists really know. Windy geology:  Wind is a more powerful force for eroding mountains than previously thought.  University of Arizona quoted Paul Kapp, an associate professor of geosciences at U of A saying, […]
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Biomimetics

Follow the Insects
March 15, 2011
Science has good reason to study insects – not just because they are the most numerous and diverse animals on the planet.  They know some tricks we would do well to emulate.  Robot designers are taking the lead on following insects. Print a fly:  New printers are allowing inventors to print the paper-thin wings they […]
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Bible and Theology

Don’t Tell the Creationists
March 12, 2011
John Horgan, a blogger for Scientific American, wanted to use this headline 20 years ago, but the editor didn’t let him.  Now that editor is gone, so Horgan let the cat out of the bag: “Pssst!  Don’t tell the creationists, but scientists don’t have a clue how life began.”  Well, he just did.     […]
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Darwin and Evolution

Assessing Evolutionary Explanations
March 11, 2011
No matter the biological discovery, evolutionists are ready with their explanations.  The explanations, however, are often riddled with puzzles, surprises, and seemingly arbitrary appeals to chance.  Do such explanations really provide more understanding than those of creationists, who explain that living things were designed for a purpose? Shrimp deal:  “Many deep-sea species have close relatives […]
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Education

Word Choice Affects Scientific Impact
March 8, 2011
The emotional reaction to scientific ideas can change depending on the words used.  Can words manipulate public opinion?     “Wording matters,” said Jonathon Schuldt [U of Michigan] in a press release posted on PhysOrg.  His team found that opinion polls yielded a 16% difference among Republicans depending on whether they were asked if global […]
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Mind and Brain

Is the Mind a Computer?
March 5, 2011
After a computer named Watson beat two contestants on Jeopardy last month, people are asking if the human mind is becoming obsolete.  What are the similarities and differences between gray matter and deep blue?     PhysOrg asked, “Machines beat us at our own game: What can we do?”  For one thing, they should have […]
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Media

Philosophy Roundup
February 27, 2011
Philosophy of science is a broad discipline incorporating many sub-disciplines such as intellectual history, sociology, ethics, rhetoric, logic, demarcation of science from pseudoscience, classification, discovery, verification, explanation and more.  A dozen recent news stories discussed some of these topics. Medical ethics:  PhysOrg reproduced an AP story about medical research on humans in the US in […]
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