Origins

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Paper View: Cosmic Questions, Personal Implications

May 11, 2006

A good question provokes good thinking. It stimulates the imagination and inspires reasoning about profound issues. It focuses attention on problems, calls for clarification of assumptions, and leads to good follow-up questions, too. Such a good question was asked in four simple words by Sean M. Carroll1 (U of Chicago, Enrico Fermi Institute) this month […]

Education

Book: Darwin Centurions Join Forces Against ID Visigoths

May 9, 2006

A new book attacking intelligent design has chapters by most of the big names in evolutionary thought: Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, Jerry Coyne, and others. An introduction to the book Intelligent Thought: Science vs. the Intelligent Design Movement (ed. John Brockman, Vintage Press, May 2006), with a synopsis of each chapter, is available at The […]

Origin of Life

The Porridge Before the Soup: Too Hot?

May 8, 2006

In the evolutionary theory of everything, there is a soup before the primordial soup we normally think of. It’s the solar nebula, the whirling disk of dust, gas and ice that preceded the planets. Scientists used to think the nebula was differentiated like chemicals in a giant centrifuge, with the rocks close to the sun […]

Health

Doctors Deny Darwin

May 5, 2006

Doctors and medical professionals may comprise the largest block of scientists with qualms about evolution. According to a Finkelstein poll, an average of 60% of doctors, depending on religious demographics, reject the completely unguided Darwinian evolutionary explanation for life. A new organization, Physicians and Surgeons for Scientific Integrity (PSSI), has begun a website Doctors Doubting […]

Intelligent Design

Solar Eclipses Unique to Earth, SETI Researcher Finds

May 4, 2006

Like many before him, Seth Shostak pondered the significance of total solar eclipses for the one planet with observers to appreciate them. “OK, I’ve done the math,” the SETI Institute director said for SETI Thursday on Space.com. “What you always suspected might be true … is true: namely that the best place in the solar […]

Cell Biology

Will Genetics Be Neo-Darwinisms Downfall?

May 4, 2006

The Institute for Creation Research is gearing up for a multi-year GENE project to look for evidence for design (and against evolution) in the genome. They may not need to work very hard. Secular scientists, by continuing to find things not all that helpful for neo-Darwinism, are doing yeoman’s work for them. While […]

Biomimetics

Insects Lead the Way

April 28, 2006

Why engineer things from scratch, when we can imitate nature? Two recent examples come from the world of insects. A press release from UC Berkeley begins, “Using the eyes of insects such as dragonflies and houseflies as models, a team of bioengineers at University of California, Berkeley, has created a series of artificial compound eyes.” […]

Genetics

Non-Coding DNA Has Far More Complexity Than Was Imagined

April 27, 2006

The concept of “junk DNA” appears to be fading away. “A mathematical analysis of the human genome suggests that so-called ‘junk DNA’ might not be so useless after all,” reported Paul Rincon for the BBC News. The photo caption reads, “The genome may possess far more complexity than was imagined.” A team from […]

Dumb Ideas

Stupid Evolution Quote of the Week: Astrobiology Takes on I.D.

April 26, 2006

The Center for Astrobiology at the University of Boulder is hosting a symposium today entitled, “Fossils and Genes: Exploring the Evolution of Life.” Douglas Futuyma (State University of New York) calls Evolution the “most important theory in biology.” By his own admission, though, it is a theory filled with paradoxes: Evolution is both a fact […]

Darwin and Evolution

Paper View: Cambrian Explosion Damage Control

April 23, 2006

Like some federal official holding a press conference after a disaster, a Harvard paleontologist has tackled the unenviable job of explaining what Darwin called the most severe challenge that could be levied against his theory: the fossil record. The challenge starts with a bang...

Education

The Politics of Darwinism: Dictate, Slander, Block

April 21, 2006

In a state of panic over the rise of intelligent design and creationism, most scientific societies supporting Darwinism are doing what their opponents feel is doomed to fail: avoiding, at all costs, a fair and intellectual debate about the evidence. Instead, many pro-Darwin forces issue prepared statements, misrepresent their opponents, and use legal maneuvering to […]

Astronomy

Astrobiology Ten Years Later: Can It Justify Its Funding?

April 17, 2006

Astrobiology just turned ten years old, but is experiencing growing pains, partly due to a starvation diet. This “science without a subject” (as George Gaylord Simpson quipped about its predecessor, exobiology) is struggling to justify itself at the Congressional feeding trough. Proponents tout it as the most important subject in the universe. Why, then, is […]

Genetics

Isolated DNA Bases Are Destroyed Quickly

April 11, 2006

Without water, DNA bases fall apart quickly. Any origin-of-life models expecting the building blocks of DNA (nucleotides) to stick around for long are going to suffer, say researchers from Oregon State University. The molecules can enter a “dark state” in which they are highly vulnerable to UV radiation. This idea was once considered “scientific heresy” […]

Dumb Ideas

The Evolution of Irreducible Complexity

April 6, 2006

It must be open season on Intelligent Design (ID). Yesterday, Nature tried defense with a new missing link claim (04/06) and today, Science is printing a story to tackle ID’s offensive line, irreducible complexity (see U of Oregon press release and EurekAlert). The Discovery Institute immediately jumped to the match, with Mr. Irreducible Complexity himself, […]

Biomimetics

Experimental Biologists Look to Animals for Inspiration

April 5, 2006

Whether insects, fish, birds or mammals, animals have a lot to teach scientists and engineers. Here are some recent stories that begin to answer, “How do they do that?” with hopes that humans might be able to mimic their feats. Hard sponges: Aimee Cunningham in Science News (03/25/2006; 169:12, p. 184) described the astonishment Joanna […]

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