If confirmed, what should Francis Collins do first at NIH? Guess which priority came out ahead?

British physicist David J. Tyler writes, in “Humanity as the second orang-utan” (ARN, 2 July 2009) The world of human phylogeny has been hit by a bombshell. Although scholars and textbooks are presenting chimpanzees as man’s closest relatives, Grehan and Schwartz have revived the case for orangutans. They consider hominoids to be comprised of two sister clades: the human-orangutan clade (dental hominoids) and the chimpanzee-gorilla clade (African apes). They claim that humans and orangutans “share a common ancestor that excludes the extant African apes”. Since it is received wisdom that chimps are the nearest relative to humans because we share over 98% of their genes and since humans are referred to as the “third chimpanzee”, the ramifications of the new Read More ›

According to British physicist David Tyler, here “Michael Reiss revisits his worldview theme.” In his discussion of the nature of science, Reiss draws attention to the work of Robert Merton and Karl Popper. Whilst there is much of value here, he writes, “most historians and philosophers of science would argue that there is more to the nature of science”. He considers the “seminal contributions” of Thomas Kuhn and the concept of scientific paradigms, plus the related analysis of research programs by Lakatos. More recently, science has become “more influenced by politics; it is more industrialized; and it is more bureaucratic.” Then comes the conclusion: “The effect of these changes is to make the boundaries around the city of science a Read More ›

A correspondent posed me this interesting question about the infant grasping reflex:

Incidentally, what do the ID and the Evolution-is-limited-in-scope (Behe, et all) do with data like this:

 Basically, it makes zero sense that infants have grasping capability since their mothers don’t have, and never had, fur.

Hmm.

I replied, as follows:
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Just recently, Darwin lobbyist Eugenie Scott was referred to as Darwin’s golden retriever. In a similar vein, Richard Dawkins is styled Darwin’s Rottweiler. Yes, yes, it’s true, Thomas Henry Huxley was known as Darwin’s bulldog, for his dogged defense of his patron’s views. But Huxley was socially far inferior to Darwin in a sharply class-based society, so it made intuitive sense that his inferiority be emphasized. So what’s with this modern penchant for self-abasement? Better to be Darwin’s dog than a traditional human being with a mind and soul? Well, they said it of themselves or their friends said it of them. I didn’t. In general, I can’t pretend to understand the ridiculous hagiography of the ol’ Brit toff Darwin, Read More ›

I am so glad that Lawrence M. Krauss, cosmologist and director of the Origins Initiative at Arizona State University, exists, so we don’t have to invent him.

He and I turned out to share a taste for talking about religion and about journalism, which I discovered during his evening address at the Canadian Science Writers’ convention in Sudbury in May. Most recently, in “God and Science don’t mix” for the Wall Street Journal (June 26, 2009), he advanced the view that “A scientist can be a believer. But professionally, at least, he can’t act like one.” Nonetheless, he insists,

… while scientific rationality does not require atheism, it is by no means irrational to use it as the basis for arguing against the existence of God, and thus to conclude that claimed miracles like the virgin birth are incompatible with our scientific understanding of nature.

However, I bet he doesn’t have nearly the same sympathy for using facts of science to demonstrate the existence of God, as astronomer Hugh Ross does. A man of science cannot afford to be that broad-minded, after all, … but I digress.

But now, here’s something really interesting: Krauss relates that he was on a “Science, Faith, Religion” panel at the World Science Festival in New York City ( June 13, 2009). As an atheist, he was paired with philosopher Colin McGinn. On the other side were “devoutly Catholic” biologist Ken Miller and Vatican astronomer Brother Guy Consolmagno, with ABC’s Bill Blakemore moderating. Krauss raised the question of the virgin birth of Jesus. He recalls, Read More ›

Everybody seems to be taking a whack at evolutionary psychology these days, and David Brooks gets in his shot in “Human Nature Today” (New York Times, June 26, 2009).

Evolutionary psychology has had a good run. But now there is growing pushback. Sharon Begley has a rollicking, if slightly overdrawn, takedown in the current Newsweek. And “Spent” is a sign that the theory is being used to try to explain more than it can bear.

The first problem is that far from being preprogrammed with a series of hardwired mental modules, as the E.P. types assert, our brains are fluid and plastic. We’re learning that evolution can be a more rapid process than we thought. It doesn’t take hundreds of thousands of years to produce genetic alterations.

Moreover, we’ve evolved to adapt to diverse environments. Different circumstances can selectively activate different genetic potentials. Individual behavior can vary wildly from one context to another. An arrogant bully on the playground may be meek in math class. People have kaleidoscopic thinking styles and use different cognitive strategies to solve the same sorts of problems.

Evolutionary psychology leaves the impression that human nature was carved a hundred thousand years ago, and then history sort of stopped. But human nature adapts to the continual flow of information—adjusting to the ancient information contained in genes and the current information contained in today’s news in a continuous, idiosyncratic blend.

Sharon Begley’s account, in my view, was not overdrawn, it was overdue. Re “Spent” – this sounds-like forgettable book takes evolutionary psychology to the shopping mall to show what we are genetically “hardwired” to buy and why, according to six (count ’em) big traits. Read More ›

The pieces of the ancient flute comprise a 22-centimetre instrument with five holes and a notched end. Conard said the flute is 35,000 years old. “It’s unambiguously the oldest instrument in the world,” said Conard. His findings were published online Wednesday by the journal Nature. Other archeologists agreed with Conard’s assessment. Well, that’s reassuring. The Hohle Fels flute is more complete and appears slightly older than bone and ivory fragments from seven other flutes recovered in southern German caves and documented by Conard and his colleagues in recent years. Now, here’s the interesting part: Roebroeks said it’s difficult to say how cognitively and socially advanced these people were. But the physical trappings of their lives — including musical instruments, personal Read More ›

In “Dogs’ ‘guilty’ behavior may be owners’ projection” (Seattle Times, July 3, 2009), Rob Stein reports that the “”guilty look dogs display may not be evidence that the dog is aware of guilt:

Horowitz asked each owner to show the dog a biscuit, instruct the dog not to eat it and leave the room. While the owner was gone, Horowitz either allowed the dog to eat the treat or removed it. The owner returned and was told the dog had obeyed the command or had been disobedient and had eaten the biscuit. Owners scolded the disobedient dogs. But half the time, the owners were told the truth about whether their dog had misbehaved while the other half were misled.

And this is the surprising thing: The dogs that had obeyed were just as likely as the ones that did not to exhibit one of nine behaviors associated with the “guilty look”: dropping their head, pulling their ears back, avoiding eye contact, rolling over onto their side or back, dropping their tails, quickly wagging a lowered tail, licking their lips, offering a paw or slinking away.

Horowitz found that the pooches were most likely to show such behaviors when their owner believed they had disobeyed and scolded them.

“The most guilty look was when the owner scolded an innocent dog,” she said. “It was a bit surprising.”

Really, it’s not all that surprising if we keep one thing in mind: Read More ›

Cleaning out the In box, I noticed “Study Plunges Standard Theory of Cosmology Into Crisis” (ScienceDaily (May 5, 2009), in which we learn:

“The only solution would be to reject Newtońs classical theory of gravitation,” says Pavel Kroupa. “We probably live in a non-Newton universe. If this is true, then our observations could be explained without dark matter.” Such approaches are finding support amongst other research teams in Europe, too.

It would not be the first time that Newton’s theory of gravitation had to be modified over the past hundred years. This became necessary in three special cases: when high velocities are involved (through the Special Theory of Relativity), in the proximity of large masses (through the theory of General Relativity), and on sub-atomic scales (through quantum mechanics). The deviations detected in the satellite galaxy data support the hypothesis that in space where extremely weak accelerations predominate, a “modified Newton dynamic” must be adopted. This conclusion has far-reaching consequences for fundamental physics in general, and also for cosmological theories.

Astrophysicist Bob Sanders from the University of Groningen declares: “The authors of this paper make a strong argument. Their result is entirely consistent with the expectations of modified Newtonian dynamics (MOND), but completely opposite to the predictions of the dark matter hypothesis. Rarely is an observational test so definite.”

Well, this is a nice change from speculation.

See also: “Time for a New Theory of Gravitation? Satellite Galaxies Challenge Newtonian Model” (ScienceDaily, Apr. 23, 2009) where some of the same cast of characters note e this problem: Read More ›

It is remarkable that people pay evolutionist Jerry Coyne to indoctrinate their children according to his dogmatic religious beliefs. But they do, and he does. And the University of Chicago biology professor has now enshrined evolution’s theological convictions in his new book, Why Evolution is True, for all to see. Here is one example: Continue here

In “Science, Spirituality, and Some Mismatched Socks” (Wall Street Journal, May 5, 2009)”, Gautam Naik explains how “researchers turn up evidence of ‘spooky’ quantum behavior and put it to work in encryption and philosophy.”: Last year, Dr. Gisin and colleagues at Geneva University described how they had entangled a pair of photons in their lab. They then fired them, along fiber-optic cables of exactly equal length, to two Swiss villages some 11 miles apart. During the journey, when one photon switched to a slightly higher energy level, its twin instantly switched to a slightly lower one. But the sum of the energies stayed constant, proving that the photons remained entangled. More important, the team couldn’t detect any time difference in Read More ›

In “How to map the multiverse” (04 May 2009), Anil Ananthaswamy explains: Greene’s transformation is emblematic of a profound change among the majority of physicists. Until recently, many were reluctant to accept this idea of the “multiverse”, or were even belligerent towards it. However, recent progress in both cosmology and string theory is bringing about a major shift in thinking. Gone is the grudging acceptance or outright loathing of the multiverse. Instead, physicists are starting to look at ways of working with it, and maybe even trying to prove its existence. If such ventures succeed, our universe will go the way of Earth – from seeming to be the centre of everything to being exposed as just a backwater in Read More ›

From the recent Pew Report, we learn:

Synopsis Of The Second Chapter Of  Signature In The Cell by Stephen Meyer

ISBN: 9780061894206; ISBN10: 0061894206; HarperOne

When the 19^th century chemist Friedrich Wohler synthesized urea in the lab using simple chemistry, he set in motion the ball that would ultimately knock down the then-pervasive ‘Vitalistic’ view of biology.  Life’s chemistry, rather than being bound by immaterial ‘vital forces’ could indeed by artificially made.  While Charles Darwin offered little insight on how life originated, several key scientists would later jump on Wohler’s ‘Eureka’-style discovery through public proclamations of their own ‘origin of life’ theories.  The ensuing materialist view was espoused by the likes of Ernst Haeckel and Rudolf Virchow who built their own theoretical suppositions on Wohler’s triumph.  Meyer summed up the logic of the day

“If organic matter could be formed in the laboratory by combining two inorganic chemical compounds then perhaps organic matter could have formed the same way in nature in the distant past” (p.40)

Read More ›