2014

It is not that evolution is not true. Of course evolution is true—I evolved when I had breakfast this morning. As evolutionists like to say, evolution is mere change over time. Thus the changing of gene frequencies is a favorite proof text for evolution. But by broadening the definition of evolution to include anything and everything aside from absolute stasis, the term becomes essentially meaningless and ripe for equivocation.  Read more

It’s not that speculation about flexible, cartoon hypotheses that are religiously motivated, supposed to have occurred long ago and are not falsifiable is wrong. But we shouldn’t confuse it with science. To wit, evolutionist Christoph Adami’s latest work skips those annoying scientific details and instead takes a high-level view of the origin of life:  Read more

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 ›