E-I-E-I-O in Old McDarwin’s Animal Farm
February 3, 2004
Some beliefs about origins are more equal than others.
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How Snakes Lost Their Limbs
February 2, 2004
Penn State scientists have a story for how snakes, which presumably evolved from lizards, lost their legs. They had to burrow through tight places. Part of their story involved disproving that snakes evolved from sea-going reptiles, like mosasaurs, explains the press release from Penn State’s Eberly College of Science. They compared genes from […]
Extinction Puzzle Explained as Selection Effect
February 1, 2004
It’s not evolution, it’s statistics. That’s the conclusion of Robert Scotland and Michael Sanderson in the Jan. 30 issue of Science. What’s the puzzle? When biodiversity is examined in the context of species richness, a consistent feature emerges: Most taxonomic groups are species-poor, relatively few are species-rich, and the frequency distribution has the shape of […]
For Complex Life, Just Add Oxygen
January 29, 2004
When you take in a breath of fresh air, you let in a lively but dangerous molecule that would kill you if it were not that your cells have elaborate controls to utilize its energy for good and avoid its damaging potential. Oxygen makes forests burn to ashes but also powers your muscles. Astrobiologists realize […]
How to Get Engineering Without an Engineer
January 28, 2004
The study of complex systems is all the rage these days (see, for example, 08/18/2003 entry). In the Jan. 28 issue of Nature,1 J. M. Ottino (Northwestern University) mixes up biology with human design in his Concepts essay on “Engineering complex systems.” “Complex systems,” he explains, “can be identified by what they do […]
La Brea Tar Pits Trap Scientists
January 24, 2004
Visitors to the La Brea Tar Pits are not told the whole truth about the fossils.
Minnesota Debates Darwin Teaching
January 22, 2004
Minnesota is next in line in the Darwin wars. This science framework writing committee has taken the unusual step of submitting two drafts to the legislature, a majority report with the usual Darwin-only rule, and a minority with two improvements, according to Seth Cooper of the Discovery Institute: The first benchmark improvement proposed by the […]
Does Microevolution Add Up?
January 15, 2004
Do numerous small changes add up to big ones, like Darwin thought? In the Jan. 15 issue of Nature,1 New Zealand kiwi David Penny (Allan Wilson Center for Molecular Ecology and Evolution, Massey University) is hopeful that the new chimp genome will prove it so: The fundamental issue here is Darwin’s bold claim that “numerous, […]
Your Bacteria Ancestors
January 12, 2004
Dr. Peter Antonelli thinks he has mathematically proven that all multicellular organisms, including plants and animals and human beings, came from two ancient bacteria that met and formed a stable, consistent relationship. His boast is explained on a University of Alberta press release. He thinks most biologists don’t comprehend his mathematical models yet, but EurekAlert […]
How Enzymes Work But Dont Ask Where They Came From: Just Believe
January 12, 2004
Enzymes are protein machines in the cell that speed up reactions that normally would proceed very slowly or not at all. Four biochemists publishing in the Jan. 9 issue of Science1 describe the exquisite power of these biological catalysts: “Enzyme catalysis, which can produce rate accelerations as large as a factor of 1019, involves molecular […]
Book
January 7, 2004
The Discovery Institute in Seattle has published a new book, Darwinism, Design and Public Education, by John Angus Campbell and Stephen C. Meyer, encouraging schools to teach both sides of the controversy over Darwinism vs Intelligent Design. The Darwin Party’s spin doctoring that students should be protected from the controversy over Darwinism is unpopular and […]
Discussions Increase About Science and Religion
January 5, 2004
Cary McMullen, writing for the Lakeland Ledger (Florida), has listed some recent developments indicating that more and more scientists and theologians are becoming interested in the relationship between science and religion. His list spans a spectrum from atheistic opinions of Stephen Weinberg to neo-orthodox views of Fuller Seminary, with a variety of voices and views […]
Chinese Puzzle: New Primate Fossil Raises Eyebrows
January 1, 2004
A new fossil primate skull from China, alleged to be 55 million years old, provides “much-needed substantial evidence of early primates in Asia,” says Robert Martin (Field Museum, Chicago), reporting in the Jan. 1 issue of Nature.1 But “interpretation of the creature’s eye size and activity pattern,” he says, “will spark debate.” (This is code […]
How Darwinism Produces Job Security
December 22, 2003
One thing Darwinism has going for it: it provides endless opportunities to research stories that are nearly impossible to prove. A case in point was provided in the Dec. 18 issue of Nature.1 John R. Hutchinson (Royal Veterinary College, UK), in a News and Views article on bird evolution, reviewed the new angle […]
Tired of Old Gaia? Try This: New Gaia
December 18, 2003
James Lovelock gets the stage without flying fruit (yet) in the December 18 issue of Nature.1 His 1970-ish “living earth” view of evolution, the Gaia hypothesis, in which life and the earth co-evolve together as one big living system, gets a new screening as what might be called neo-Gaia in an unrefuted Concepts piece in […]