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Darwin and Evolution

Darwin’s Finches: Researchers Tweak the Beak
September 3, 2004
Every once in awhile, a new angle on Darwin’s finches (an icon of evolution) appears in print. Peter and Rosemary Grant, who have devoted their life to studying everything possible about these related species of birds that inhabit the Galápagos Islands – only to find that evolutionary changes are reversible (see 04/26/2002 headline) – have […]
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Origin of Life

Pop Goes the Fatbubble Theory for the Origin of Life
September 3, 2004
This weird theory pops faster than the bubbles it describes as our ancestors.
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Intelligent Design

Are We Lost on a Speck of Cosmic Dust?
September 1, 2004
A new Copernican revolution seems to be in the works, not another “demotion” of man from the center of the universe, but a promotion back to the ancient idea of plan or purpose for our existence.  The demotions reached their nadir with Carl Sagan’s Cosmos and other books that declared we are nothing special, that […]
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Intelligent Design

School Science “Tyranny” Tries to Scare Off Lecture Critical of Darwinism
August 18, 2004
Is a high school campus an open marketplace of ideas and a guarantor of free speech?  Look at this story in Agape Press about the troubles a high school student endured trying to get Michael Behe to speak at an after-school lecture this past February.  Though an optional event not during normal operating hours, and […]
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Intelligent Design

SETI Ponders the Silence
August 13, 2004
Since no clear signals from space aliens have yet arrived in 40 years of looking, SETI thinkers are asking why.  They’re coming up with a variety of explanations.  Here are three possibilities from recent articles. Too Soon to Tell.  Seth Shostak of the SETI Institute, writing in the September cover story of Astronomy Magazine, isn’t […]
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Cell Biology

ATP Synthase: Another Unexpected Case of Fine Tuning
August 10, 2004
ATP synthase, the miniature rotary motor that powers our cells, has been a subject of great interest since the elucidation of its rotary function won three scientists a Nobel prize in 1997.  As an example of a precision-crafted, true electric rotary motor in living systems (another being the larger bacterial flagellum), it also provides a […]
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Origin of Life

A Martian Crust: Was It Alive?
August 9, 2004
David McKay, the father of the Martian meteorite that started feverish debates about life on Mars in 1996, is at it again.  Now he thinks a mat of crusty soil was made by microbes, according to Space.Com.     In spite of the salty, acidic soil (see 08/06/04 headline), Gilbert Levin, also interviewed by Space.Com, […]
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Cell Biology

Cell Nucleus Complexity Baffles Evolutionists
August 6, 2004
In her inimitable way, Science reporter Elizabeth Pennisi has once again portrayed a scientific controversy undergoing active ferment.  This time it’s about the evolutionary origin of cell nuclei, which she terms “specialized, DNA-filled command centers.”1  At the conclusion, she gives prominence to a “provocative, but circumstantial and controversial” suggestion that viruses taught cells how to […]
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Education

Kansas Elects Two ID-Friendly School Board Members
August 6, 2004
According to John Calvert writing for Access Research Network, Kansans defeated two pro-evolution candidates for the state school board, electing instead Kathy Martin and Steve Abrams who both oppose the “evolution-only” policy.     Martin won against Bruce Wyatt, an incumbent who based his entire campaign on the need to keep intelligent design or creation […]
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Cell Biology

Gymnastic Enzyme Acts Like Logic Gate
July 31, 2004
An enzyme named vinculin undergoes “drastic” conformational changes, reports William A. Weis in the July 29 issue of Nature.1  Vinculin, with over a thousand amino acid links, is important at membrane junctions for transporting materials in and out of the cell.  It helps cellular “glue” exit the membrane so that neighboring cells can adhere to […]
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Education

In the Last Days There Shall Be Scoffers
July 28, 2004
Current Biology this week contains two entries either attacking creationism or exalting Charles Darwin.1,2  Nigel Williams reports on the 100th birthday of Ernst Mayr (see 07/02/2004 headline), and his “tireless campaign against creationism”: Ernst Mayr, the renowned evolutionary biologist and champion of Darwin, celebrated his 100th birthday earlier this month by leading a scathing attack […]
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Astronomy

Tau Ceti a Star for Life to Avoid
July 6, 2004
Tau Ceti, a star with a dust disk astronomers had hoped might be an example of a planetary system under construction, is more like a war zone.  A press release from the Royal Observatory calls it “Asteroid Alley – an Inhospitable Neighbor.”  Using the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope in Hawaii, the astronomers detected 10 times […]
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Cell Biology

Cell Technology Celebrated
July 1, 2004
Humans are just beginning to imitate the manufacturing techniques cells use all the time, right under our noses.  A book just came out about the subject, entitled Bionanotechnology: Lessons from Nature by David S. Goodsell.  It’s hard to tell if Christof M. Niemeyer was more impressed with the book or with the living machines themselves, […]
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Cosmology

ID Book Survives Nature Relatively Unscathed
June 24, 2004
Considering the intemperate disdain intelligent design books usually receive from the major journals – when they are even noticed (see, for example, Nature’s review of a book by William Dembski in the 07/11/2002 headline) – a new ID book fared surprisingly well this week.  In Nature1 June 24, Douglas A. Vakoch (SETI Institute) reviewed the […]
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Origin of Life

Mystery of the Left-Handed Proteins: Solved?
June 21, 2004
Some molecules come in left- and right-handed forms that are mirror images of each other.  All biological proteins are composed of only left-handed amino acids.  How this could have come about in a primordial soup has long been a puzzle to origin-of-life researchers, since both L (levo, left-handed) and D (dextro, right-handed) forms react indiscriminately.  […]
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