Don Johnson, with Ph.Ds in Chemistry and Computer & Information Sciences, was certain that evolution was a fact until he realized that evolutionary theory had gone beyond the science. Watch this terrific video to see the role of information in molecular biology.  See more

Rafi Letzler has written a fascinating article titled, Is a simulated brain conscious? in which he poses several interesting thought experiments. For instance, would a group of people standing together in a giant field, with each person obeying the rules that one of the 86 billion neurons in a typical human brain obeys, possess a collective group consciousness? What about a supercomputer that can simulate the entire brain of a human being? Or what about a Boltzmann brain, formed by atoms suddenly coalescing together at random in an exact replica of the atoms in a human brain? Dr. Scott Aaronson, a theoretical computer scientist at MIT, offers his own thought-provoking answers to these questions, but in this post, I’d like Read More ›

Catholic blogger Simcha Fischer has written an excellent post titled, But what if we’re not scientists?, which addresses the question: how can laypeople decide whether or not to accept a scientist’s say-so on a given topic? She warns against some of the common cognitive pitfalls that we are all liable to make, on occasions (I’ve listed her key points only): So, how do we go about deciding which experts to trust, and which to be suspicious of? Here are a few of the traps we can fall into: Mistrusting a knowledgeable person because he expresses his ideas in an unpleasant way.… Mistrusting a knowledgeable person simply because he said something that makes you mad or upset or scared. Trusting a Read More ›

Simon Hadlington of Chemistry World reports that quantum mechanical simulations of the 1953 Miller-Urey experiment, which used an electrical discharge to generate amino acids from simple organic molecules, suggest that formic acid and formamide may have acted as short-lived chemical intermediates in the reactions that gave rise to life on Earth. However, some experts are not convinced. Nir Goldman, from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, notes: “One criticism is that the authors chose to use a somewhat reduced or hydrogen-rich mixture in their study, whereas the atmosphere on early Earth is thought to have been carbon dioxide rich, which could entail very different chemistry in the presence of an electric field.” Jeffrey Bada, from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, was not Read More ›

The rift between P.Z. Myers and Richard Dawkins is now official. After Dawkins tweeted that he admired equity feminist Christina Hoff Summers (the author of Who Stole Feminism?) for her bravery, and mockingly referred to Myers’ Free Thought Blog as the “Feedingfrenzy Thoughtpolice Bullies”, Myers hit back, accusing Sommers of being “an anti-feminist … on a mission … to discredit all of feminism” and added: “Well, I’m going to have to write off Richard Dawkins now. He’s been eaten by the brain parasites… I couldn’t be more shocked if Dawkins had endorsed a creationist… Thanks, Richard Dawkins! You’re now officially an anti-feminist!” Sommers’ great crime, apparently, consisted in being currently employed by the American Enterprise Institute, which Myers labeled “a Read More ›

Here’s a link to a Science Daily article on epigenetics. The authors report that the known and studied method of epigenetic marking, methylation of Histone3=H3, is not only passed down from one cell generation to another during development, but that these epigenetic markings are passed on from one generation of organisms to the next. These findings suggest that the neo-Darwinian mechanisms normally invoked in evolutionary discussions may or may not be critical for “adaptation.” If further studies confirms the widespread phenomena of epigentic markings being handed down from generation to generation, then there may not be much force left to the evolutionary tales we’ve been told over the years. What I mean is this. We are told that organisms, in Read More ›

I just received my copy of Lee Spetner’s new book, The Evolution Revolution which follows his earlier Not By Chance! In these books Spetner lays out a new theory of origins, a new way of looking at biology, and really a new way of doing science, at least in the life sciences. I couldn’t agree more with his approach. Spetner’s overarching point is not that evolution does not occur, but that it is very different from how we normally understand that word. Spetner’s new approach—which he calls the nonrandom evolutionary hypothesis (NREH)—is data driven. NREH is an empirical idea, based on observations, not a rationalist idea based on a prior axioms. Mutations are effective, not random; evolution is directed to the need, not undirected; Read More ›

I recently explained that Darwin, as well as evolution co-discoverer Alfred Wallace, came to believe in transmutation and so they then sought a suitable mechanism. That comes straight from leading Darwin historian Janet Browne. And why did Darwin and Wallace “believe in transmutation” in the absence of a known mechanism? Both Darwin and Wallace made it clear in their writings that their reasoning was metaphysical. The biological world did not meet with their creationist expectations. God would never have created this world and so evolution was the answer, even though they didn’t know how it could occur. Again, this is well recognized by historians. Darwin’s books, papers and notebook entries were chocked full of religious arguments.  Read more

In 1859 scientists were skeptical of Charles Darwin’s new theory of evolution for obvious reasons. For example, how could new designs evolve by themselves? Now that evolution is an accepted truth, evolutionists can discuss the state of the theory. As a new paper explains, “How body pattern evolves in nature remains largely unknown.”  Read more