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Update re John Lennon vs. Charles Darwin: Lennon earliest to diss Darwin profs?

“It keeps all the old professors happy in the university. It gives them something to do. I don’t know if there’s any harm in it except they ram it down everybody’s throat.” At Evolution News & Views, David Klinghoffer elaborates on Lennon’s Darwin-dissing views: He laughed at what he regarded as the ludicrousness of Darwinian theory, comparing it with young earth creationism. This was in an interview with Playboy, one of the last he gave and reprinted in a book by journalist David Sheff, All We Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono (St. Martin’s Griffin, 2000): Nor do I think we came from monkeys, by the way… That’s another piece of garbage. What the Read More ›

Review: The Myth of Junk DNA

Jonathan Wells’ The Myth of Junk DNA, is a well-written book that manages to accomplish two separate tasks: to silence the Darwinists who had claimed that recent genomic discoveries supported their dystopic version of The Signature in the Cell; and to bring all of us up-to-date on the breath-taking mysteries being decoded from this most ancient script. He begins by picking up where Stephen Meyer left off, telling us that within each cell is this memory chip, this software program that directs everything we are and ever meant to be. When Watson and Crick decoded the DNA, there was great expectation that soon we would find the gene to every talent and attribute we had ever wished we had been Read More ›

Darwin matters far more in politics than your history teacher ever let on

marvin olasky

Here, Martin Olasky, editor-in-chief of World tells us how “Darwin matters” (June 29, 2011):

Politics.Woodrow Wilson started federal government expansion in 1912 by opposing the “Newtonian” view that the government should have an unchanging constitutional foundation, somewhat like “the law of gravitation.” He argued that government should be “accountable to Darwin, not to Newton. It is modified by its environment, necessitated by its tasks, shaped to its functions by the sheer pressure of life. . . . Living political constitutions must be Darwinian in structure and in practice.” Wilson was the president who started the modern pattern of disregarding the Constitution, and in the 2012 election we will either start a second century of governmental expansion or yell, “Stop!” Read More ›

Darwin Matters

Marvin Olasky at Townhall.com has written an essay with this title. Here are a few excerpts: Woodrow Wilson started federal government expansion in 1912 by opposing the “Newtonian” view that the government should have an unchanging constitutional foundation, somewhat like “the law of gravitation.” He argued that government should be “accountable to Darwin, not to Newton. It is modified by its environment, necessitated by its tasks, shaped to its functions by the sheer pressure of life. . . . Living political constitutions must be Darwinian in structure and in practice.” … Evolutionary thinking influenced not only Social Darwinists but socialists like H.G. Wells who thought it was time to advance beyond competitive enterprise. (Karl Marx in Das Kapital called Darwin’s Read More ›

Here’s a first: A reviewer skeptical of airhead neuroscience claims

The Compass of Pleasure: How Our Brains Make Fatty Foods, Orgasm, Exercise, Marijuana, Generosity, Vodka, Learning, and Gambling Feel So Good

That’s Adam Hanft on the recent The Compass of Pleasure by neuroscientist David J. Linden, who writes at Barnes & Noble Reviews (June 27, 2011):

Disciplines from neuroscience to behavioral psychology to evolutionary biology have created a new cranial transparency that’s unleashed a gush of books like Blink by Malcolm Gladwell; Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior by Ori Brafman and Ron Brafman; Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein; and The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic and Work and at Home by Dan Ariely. (I interviewed Dan about his book for the Barnes & Noble Review.)David J. Linden, a professor of neuroscience at Johns Hopkins, and the author of The Accidental Mind, adds to this emerging, solipsistic genre with The Compass of Pleasure, a book that focuses entirely on how our brains pursue and process pleasure.

That one word “solipsistic” is  a bullet through the forehead of a writer. More telling: Read More ›

The Multiverse Gods, final part

We’ve been looking at Victor Stenger’s claim that fine-tuning is a fallacy. In part one, we looked at the two fundamental metaphysical theories of the universe–materialist and theist–recognizing how materialists have been losing ground by being forced to admit to a creation, making multiverse-theory a rear-guard action covering their retreat, which attempts to turn the unwanted creator into an impersonal force. In part two, we discussed the Widow’s Mite fallacy where Stenger uses physical units for a metaphysical property, which like Jesus’ disciples, mistakes a physical quantity for a metaphysical one. The most obvious difference between the two is that physical quantities have units, whereas metaphysical ones are unitless. But in addition, metaphysical quantities are percentages, integrals, they involve a Read More ›

Are Fitness Valleys Too Deep?

Over at PhysOrg.com, there’s a new news item about a computer program that was run simulating evolutionary characteristics. What’s interesting about it are two things: (1) who the people are that are running this program, and (2) one of the results—which is being downplayed, it would seem. First, one of the people associated with this new program is Christoph Adami, who, with others, gave us the touted “Avida” evolutionary algorithm. So, this isn’t just anybody doing this simulation. Second, here’s what the lead author had to say: “These fitness landscapes simply could not be traversed with mutations that did not interact.” This wasn’t a ‘main conclusion’ of the study; however, I don’t know about you, but this sounds to me Read More ›

Edited post: questioning liberals ever so nicely?

Following concern about the strength of this post I thought I would edit it. James Delingpole, writing in the UK Telegraph blog, asserts that liberals are confused about the basis for their beliefs – warning – this link has strong language. “…why it is that liberal-lefties manage to be so utterly wrong about everything. …they’re not interested in facts. They just want to construct their pretty little narrative about the world, regardless of whether or not it has any bearing on reality. And then they want to dump it on us. And ruin our lives.” Dare we say that this is ever so slightly naughty? Delingpole’s comments are much stronger than I would wish to write. But often those of us Read More ›

How do people understand algebra if they never encounter it?

File:Image-Al-Kitāb al-muḫtaṣar fī ḥisāb al-ğabr wa-l-muqābala.jpg
early Arabic treatise on algebra, 8th c AD

In “Geometric Principles Appear Universal in Our Minds” (Wired Science, May 24, 2011) , Bruce Bower reflects on the fact that research among peoples who do not even count suggests that abstract geometric principles are probably innate in humans:

If geometry relies on an innate brain mechanism, it’s unclear how such a neural system generates abstract notions about phenomena such as infinite surfaces and why this system doesn’t fully kick in until age 7. If geometry depends on years of spatial learning, it’s not known how people transform real-world experience into abstract geometric concepts — such as lines that extend forever or perfect right angles — that a forest dweller never encounters in the natural world.

As always, we needn’t wait long for a Darwin answer: Read More ›

Latest doctrine: It’s wrong to “believe” in Darwinian evolution, because you must accept it without thinking – Philly Inquirer

In “’Belief’ in evolution? It may be the wrong word” (06/27/2011), Faye Flam, Philadelphia Inquirer staff writer, allows us to know that we really shouldn’t say we “believe in” evolution because, as Larry Krauss puts it,

“I have attempted, largely through spurring on from several colleagues . . . to never use the word belief in talks,” said Arizona State University physicist and writer Lawrence Krauss.

“One is asked: Does one believe in global warming, or evolution, and the temptation is to answer yes,” he said, “but it’s like saying you believe in gravity or general relativity.”

“Science is not like religion, in that it doesn’t merely tell a story . . . one that one can choose to believe or not.”

Ms. Flam typefies the legacy media in decline because she cannot Read More ›

Don’t ask us how the most complex eyes appeared at the beginning. Instead, we offer to solve a tautology for you.

Thumbnail for version as of 16:27, 24 July 2008
This trilobite eye is probably diurnal, features eyeshade/ Psuedomorph

In John R. Paterson’s “Modern optics in exceptionally preserved eyes of Early Cambrian arthropods from Australia (Nature, 30 June 2011)

from Nature by, we learn of a particular, “exceptionally preserved” trilobite-like eye from South Australia that predates other known finds from 85 million years later:

The arrangement and size of the lenses indicate that these eyes belonged to an active predator that was capable of seeing in low light. The eyes are more complex than those known from contemporaneous trilobites and are as advanced as those of many living forms.

Well, that raises a question, doesn’t it? At the dawn of multicellular life, we find – not primitive fixes – but …

Then the authors deftly write, Read More ›

This just in: John Lennon doubted common descent of man and apes – so why was Yoko Ono suing Expelled?

Thumbnail for version as of 11:34, 6 March 2011
John Lennon (1940-1980) dismissed common ancestry/Roy Kerwood

From John Nolte at Andrew Breitbart’s “Big Hollywood,” we learn John Lennon’s take on evolutionary theory. “More on John Lennon’s Move Away from ‘Imagine’: Evolution is ‘Absolute Garbage’:

Even more shocking to the idea of Lennon as a secular leftist, or a deep thinker, the man rejected evolution. “Nor do I think we came from monkeys, by the way,” he insisted. “That’s another piece of garbage. What the hell’s it based on? We couldn’t’ve come from anything—fish, maybe, but not monkeys. I don’t believe in the evolution of fish to monkeys to men. Why aren’t monkeys changing into men now? It’s absolute garbage.”

Nolte is referring to Jordan Michael Smith’s article, “Stop Imagining,” kicking around since last December in American Conservative.

So why did his widow sue Expelled’s producers? (In the end, the court required her to Imagine fair use.)

Possible answer:


Read More ›

In 2006, Nature covered PZ Myers’s Pharyngula as one of the “top five science blogs.” What were they thinking?

Casey Luskin

Perhaps they weren’t thinking how other evolutionists might react. The fact that the Sage of Morris, Minnesota scored in Technorati’s top 3500 doesn’t tell us much about who reads his blog or why, and that’s now Nature made the decision. And you have to pay to read about it.

Over at Evolution News & Views (June 28, 2011), Casey Luskin advises that many fellow Darwinists are not amused by P. Z. Myers’ antics. (The one that comes immediately to some minds just now is the circus around producer Mark Mathis booting him from a screening of Expelled, but that’s probably an accident of timing.) Anyway,

In fact, the rhetorical strategies of Professor Myers and his colleagues are so uncivil that they have earned criticism from mainstream academics and writers who are otherwise pro-evolution. Read More ›

Cosmos: Universe clumpier than it is supposed to be

Also, from Stephen Battersby (New ScientistJune 21, 2011), we learn: , “Largest cosmic structures ‘too big’ for theories”: We know that the universe was smooth just after its birth. Measurements of the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB), the light emitted 370,000 years after the big bang, reveal only very slight variations in density from place to place. Gravity then took hold and amplified these variations into today’s galaxies and galaxy clusters, which in turn are arranged into big strings and knots called superclusters, with relatively empty voids in between. On even larger scales, though, cosmological models say that the expansion of the universe should trump the clumping effect of gravity. That means there should be very little structure on scales Read More ›

“Pin-ups of the cosmos” puzzle scientists

Catching up with the news from outer space, from New Scientist’s Vanessa Thomas and Richard Webb (June 13, 2011), we learn that spiral galaxies are a headscratcher for cosologists: Easy as these spiral beauties are on the eye, for cosmologists they are becoming something of a headache. As we survey the spiral galaxies around us more closely, nagging doubts are creeping in that some of the largest, most luminous examples in fact look rather too perfect. What’s more, many of them seem to be in entirely the wrong place. How can a galaxy be in the “wrong” place? Doesn’t anyone enforce our rules out there? – (Registration required)