Monthly Archives: May 2008
Will Darwin’s last refuge be popular media?
| May 31, 2008 | Posted by O'Leary under Intelligent Design |
Christian commentator Dinesh D’Souza has recently been arguing that the real problem with Darwinism in the classroom is that it is used to promote atheism. Today, I noticed he had an interesting item in TotheSource, which is not yet archived, talking about Darwin’s own agnosticism-bordering-on-atheism. I have elsewhere pointed out that Darwinism has always been […]
Dick to the Dawk says: “I don’t want to discuss evidence”
| May 31, 2008 | Posted by Dave S. under Intelligent Design |
Richard Dawkins, in a face-off with Rupert Sheldrake, says “I don’t want to discuss evidence”. As the Saturday Night Live Church Lady would say, “Well, isn’t that just precious?” Dick: “But what worries me about you is that you are prepared to believe almost anything. Science should be based on the minimum number of beliefs.” […]
“Freeze” climate or care for children: Materialism vs ID
| May 30, 2008 | Posted by DLH under Intelligent Design |
How should we spend on malnutrition compared to stabilizing global warming? Environmentalism vs common compassion come to opposite conclusions. Materialism versus intelligent causation worldviews strike again: —————– May 30, 2008 ˜Forget Climate Change, We Should Spend on Nutrition; Mark Henderson, Science Editor, Copenhagen, Times Online Malnutrition should be the world’s major priority for aid and […]
Craig Venter – 18 months to 4th generation biofuels
| May 30, 2008 | Posted by Dave S. under Biology, Comp. Sci. / Eng., Intelligent Design, Science |
Awesome. The alternative biofuel part of the talk starts at 13 minutes. I highly recommend watching it all.
CNN article on Solar Power Sats
| May 30, 2008 | Posted by Dave S. under Global Warming, Off Topic, Science |
HT to Eric Anderson for the link. How to harvest solar power? Beam it down from space! By Lara Farrar For CNN Story Highlights -Concept to beam solar power from satellites gains new global momentum -Massive satellites would beam solar energy back to ground-based receivers -Pentagon study says could be used for military operations, developing […]
Prominent theistic evolutionist Francis Collins stepping down from Genome Institute
| May 30, 2008 | Posted by O'Leary under Intelligent Design |
According to a press release from National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI): Bethesda, Md., Wed., May 28, 2008 — Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D., the director of the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), today announced his intention to step down on August 1 to explore writing […]
Times: Forget Climate Change
| May 30, 2008 | Posted by Dave S. under Global Warming, Off Topic |
Repeating what I’ve been saying for a long time – there are better ways to spend money than a preemptive strike on global warming. The UK Times publishes an article about one of those ways. Times Online May 30, 2008 Mark Henderson, Science Editor, Copenhagen ‘Forget climate change, we should spend on nutrition’ Malnutrition should […]
Klaus on Freedom vs Environmentalism – parallels ID vs Materialism?
| May 28, 2008 | Posted by DLH under Intelligent Design |
Czech President Vaclav Klaus published Blue Planet in Green Shackles and challenged Al Gore to debate on climate change. Having survived and overcome Marxism, he has fascinating insights into the parallels of centralized Marxist control mentality and the modern environmentalism trying to impose its utopian ideals on the rest of us. His insights appear to […]
Freeman Dyson – Environmentalism: The New Secular Religion
| May 27, 2008 | Posted by Dave S. under Global Warming, Off Topic |
Freeman Dyson (one of our greatest living thinkers IMO) talks about Global Warming in a New York book reviewThe Question of Global Warming . Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion. And the ethics of environmentalism are fundamentally sound. Scientists and economists can agree with Buddhist monks and Christian activists that ruthless destruction […]
Bogus Computer Simulations
| May 27, 2008 | Posted by GilDodgen under Comp. Sci. / Eng., Evolution, Religion |
This one, published by New Scientist, really takes the cake. From the article: God may work in mysterious ways, but a simple computer program may explain how religion evolved. By distilling religious belief into a genetic predisposition to pass along unverifiable information, the program predicts that religion will flourish… The model assumes… that a small […]
Out-of-print early ID book now available as a .pdf
| May 25, 2008 | Posted by O'Leary under Intelligent Design |
An early ID book (possibly the earliest), The Mystery of Life’s Origin by Charles Thaxton, Walter Bradley, and Roger Olson (1984), with a foreword by Dean Kenyon, has been out of print for a while, I am told. But a .pdf can be downloaded here for now. Information theory is a special branch of mathematics that […]
Realism & Equity on Climate Change Policies
| May 25, 2008 | Posted by DLH under Culture, Global Warming, Science |
Before spending trillions of dollars trying to control climate change, shouldn’t we get a second opinion on both the science and policy options? S. Fred Singer, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Science, U. Virginia & former director of the US Weather Satellite Service weighs in onThe Global Warming Debate. He reviews evidence against anthropogenic global warming […]
Claims of De Novo active protein
| May 24, 2008 | Posted by idnet.com.au under Intelligent Design |
This paper will be quoted for many years as the basis for faith in the de novo origin by evolution of useful proteins. How good is the evidence? De Novo Origination of a New Protein-Coding Gene in a yeast species by Wen Wang et al “THE total number of different proteins in all organisms on […]
Anyone want to try this game and let me know if it’s good?
| May 23, 2008 | Posted by O'Leary under Intelligent Design, Just For Fun |
This time on ID the Future, Casey Luskin — changing things up a little — sits down to talk with videogame artist Dennis DeMercer about his recent work on the Nintendo DS version of the forthcoming game Spore. Working with Amaze Entertainment, DeMercer was responsible for animating 3-D creatures ranging from single-celled organisms to advanced […]
Many worlds: Maybe easier to make pay than make sense?
| May 22, 2008 | Posted by O'Leary under Intelligent Design |
Bill Dembski wanted to know, re the multiverse (many worlds) theory: here: Do many worlds present a business opportunity? Would it be possible, for a modest fee, for people to have worlds named after them? Are worlds, like genes, patentable? A physicist friend figures that it’s better – or worse – than that. It might […]
“There is no controversy”
| May 22, 2008 | Posted by William Dembski under Evolution |
“There is no controversy.” “There should be no controversy.” “It’s okay to expel those who pretend that there is a controversy.” “Academic freedom does not apply where the scientific consensus says there is no controversy.” … The Washington Post has a ridiculous editorial that elevates evolutionary theory to the same status as gravitational theory and […]
Big Tent chronicles … oh, and about my new blog …
| May 21, 2008 | Posted by O'Leary under Intelligent Design |
Every single intelligent design opponent I have encountered eventually starts mumbling about the sinister “Big Tent” of ID. Big Tent = what you rent when you are entertaining 1800 of your closest friends in a shattering rainstorm The argument goes something like this: If the ID guys were sincere in thinking that the universe and […]
This Site Gives me 150 Utils of Utility; Panda’s Thumb Gives me Only 3
| May 21, 2008 | Posted by Barry Arrington under Intelligent Design |
Any effort to give precise gradations of quantification to CSI is doomed to failure. It reminds me of certain economists’ effort to quantify “utility” through a measurement called a “util.” See here. The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that the concepts are very much the same. We can all agree […]
Oxford Conference Update
| May 19, 2008 | Posted by Paul Nelson under Intelligent Design |
The Ian Ramsey Centre, Oxford A couple of weeks ago, I reported on the program for the upcoming Ian Ramsey Centre conference, “God, Nature, and Design” to be held July 10-13, 2008 at St. Anne’s College, Oxford University. An updated list of contributed papers has been posted. The list is noteworthy both for the range […]
Chance, Law, Agency or Other?
| May 19, 2008 | Posted by Barry Arrington under Intelligent Design |
Suppose you come across this tree: You know nothing else about the tree other than what you can infer from a visual inspection. Multiple Choice: A. The tree probably obtained this shape through chance. B. The tree probably obtained this shape through mechanical necessity. C. The tree probably obtained this shape through a combination of […]
