Video: [youtube 4Sspt5Bdmug] Let us watch and ponder. END

While these statistics get recompiled continually, I was pleased to wake up this morning and find that our new book, Naturalism and Its Alternatives in Scientific Methodologies is currently the #1 Hot New Release in the Scientific Research category, the #2 Hot New Release in epistemology, and the #1 Hot New Release in Psychology research.
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Last week we reported on Robert Tracinski’s take down of the New York Time’s misleading reporting on climate data.  Tracinski follows up with the Time’s reporter’s indefensible defense here. The comparison to 1998 is particularly important, because if the headline is that this year is not significantly hotter than temps 19 years ago, that take a lot of wind out of the “climate change” hysteria. It means we’re not seeing the runaway takeoff in global temperatures that the global warming theory predicted. As Judith Curry has been pointing out, recent temperatures are actually at or below the bottom range for all of the global warming predictions. That is the relevant context for this story, the failure of the data to Read More ›

The mystery, that is, of why the universe is matter and not equal and oppositely charged antimatter: From Sarah Charley at Symmetry: “We’re looking for hints,” says Stefan Ulmer, spokesperson of the BASE collaboration. “If we find a slight difference between matter and antimatter particles, it won’t tell us why the universe is made of matter and not antimatter, but it would be an important clue.” The BASE measurement shows that the magnetic moments of the proton and antiproton are identical, apart from their opposite signs, within the experimental uncertainty of 0.8 parts per million. The result improves the precision of the previous best measurement by the ATRAP collaboration in 2013, also at CERN, by a factor of six. This Read More ›

At the Economist, anyway: One common tactic in brain science is to compare damaged brains with healthy ones. If damage to part of the brain causes predictable changes in behaviour, then researchers can infer what that part of the brain does. In rats, for instance, damaging the hippocampuses—two small, banana-shaped structures buried towards the bottom of the brain—reliably interferes with the creatures’ ability to recognise objects. When applied to the chip, though, that method turned up some interesting false positives. The researchers found, for instance, that disabling one particular group of transistors prevented the chip from running the boot-up sequence of “Donkey Kong”—the Nintendo game that introduced Mario the plumber to the world—while preserving its ability to run other games. Read More ›

From ScienceDaily: In a new study published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, researchers have now found a new principle for how epigenetic changes can occur. They have showed that one enzyme, tryptase, can be found in the nucleus of cells and that tryptase can cleave off the tails of histones. In this way, certain epigenetic modifications of the histone tails are removed. A very interesting finding was that this mechanism is important for maintaining the identity of the cells. Cells that lacked tryptase showed major changes, including a loss of their cellular identity and they also started to proliferate in an uncontrolled way. These effects were seen in mast cells which are central in allergic reactions. The Read More ›

From Joshua A. Krisch at The Scientist: Ninety-six hours after 43 zebrafish were frozen to death and 48 hours after 20 mice had their necks snapped, specific cells within their bodies were still hard at work. Gene transcription continued apace, and occasionally increased, according to a study published today (January 25) in Royal Society Open Biology. Genes linked to embryonic development, stress, and cancer were among those increasingly transcribed into RNA, researchers at the University of Washington and their colleagues reported. The results suggest that organismal death is an orderly, predictable process, and could help forensic scientists pinpoint time of death, plus help explain why organs from recently deceased donors seem to be more prone to cancer. “Death is a Read More ›

Today is the 44th annual March for Life, which is being live-streamed in several locations. Let us host it here, for UD (following up from a discussion of three marches in Washington DC, here)  . . . this stream will go “live” later this morning. I note due to heightened security concerns, Airport type screening will be used for those seeking to march — the contrast with the last two marches in the same city is telling: [UPDATE — post-march video, this is an historic event] MRC two minute summary showing the crowds, civility and messages that are not in the major media: [youtube SMf10C3g54I] ADDED, HT BA77: The flow of the march — [youtube -EPZ8gMdoJc] US VP Mike Pence’s Read More ›

Suzan Mazur notes at Huffington Post that the semiotics journal Sign Systems Studies (University of Tartu Press) published an article on the recent Royal Society conference on new trends in evolution. In the opening pages of his article, Kull decides to cite the July 2008 Altenberg conference as one of those pivotal events, a meeting of scientists called to determine whether or not an extended evolutionary synthesis was needed. I was barred from attending Altenberg for getting out in front of the story. Kull then proceeds to mention branding of Altenberg as the “Woodstock of Evolution,” because it created a sensation and put the meeting on the map, gave it life. That branding took place in a newsbreaking story of Read More ›

From Maria Gallucci at Mashable: Separately, environmental and climate groups are planning a People’s Climate March in April to protest Trump’s plans to scrap former President Barack Obama’s climate policies and advance construction of controversial oil pipelines. Both climate activists and scientists said they were bolstered by the Women’s Marches, which drew millions of women and men around the world, from Washington down to Antarctica. Next to signs promoting women’s reproductive rights and dismissing Trump’s past xenophobic and misogynistic statements, many demonstrators carried posters urging participants to “Stand Up for Science” or declaring that “Climate Change is Real” — a fact that Trump said he doesn’t fully accept. More. Gee, that’ll help. When people have spent a lifetime immersed in Read More ›

From at CSS: The annual meeting this year will in Pittsburgh, April 7-8, 2016. It’s coming up soon, so you may already want to start making plans. Some space is available to stay in local homes. The location is the Twentieth Century Club in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh, near the University of Pittsburgh. The theme is “human exceptionalism” and the speakers include Jack Collins, Ph.D., professor of Old Testament at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, and author of several books, including Science and Faith, speaking on what the Bible means by the Image of God in humanity. Jeffrey Schwartz, M.D., research psychologist at UCLA, and author of several books including You Are Not Your Brain, speaking on the Read More ›

Some people have an aura.  I’m not talking about spooky New Age weirdness here.  Some people just radiate a vibe, and you don’t have to be a swami to pick up on it.  Joe was like that.  If you could take a picture of quite joy mixed with contented serenity, it would look like Joe. I am pretty sure Joe was not always joyful and serene, especially during his chemo treatments.  But you would never know it from looking at him or listening to him, because I never heard him complain. I was shocked yesterday morning when I opened the email that announced Joe’s death.  I shouldn’t have been.  Joe was past 80 and had been ill for a long Read More ›

From Blyth Institute: Many volumes have addressed the question of whether or not naturalism is a required part of scientific methodology. However, few, if any, go any further into the many concerns that arise from a rejection of naturalism. If methodological naturalism is rejected, what replaces it? If science is not naturalistic, what defines science? If naturalism is rejected, what is gained and what is lost? How does the practice of science change? What new avenues would be available, and how would they be investigated? This volume is divided into three parts. The first part considers the question of methodological naturalism and its role in the demarcation problem – deciding what is science and what isn’t. The second part discusses Read More ›

Via BeauHD at Slashdot: Popular Science reports that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is now barred from communicating with the public. [And early this morning, BuzzFeed revealed that] The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has banned scientists and other employees from sharing the results of its taxpayer-funded research with the broader public. Here. However, UDPDATE 1/24/17: The USDA has disavowed the memo sent to employees at its Agricultural Research Service unit. USDA’s deputy administrator, Michael Young, clarified that the gag order specifically applies to policy-related statements in press releases and interviews, which need to be vetted with the secretary of agriculture. He told The Washington Post that peer-reviewed scientific papers from the unit should not be blocked, nor should food Read More ›

One of the main pages on my new blog has a brief account of my journey towards accepting ID. I’ve taken a few different stances on the biological origins question in the past so it’s been a bumpy ride for me. This article is mainly autobiographical, but it gives me a chance to lay my cards on the table so I don’t have assumptions made about me and so readers know roughly where I’m coming from. Here’s a snippet: So, how and why did I become an intelligent design advocate? It’s a long(ish) story… I am, perhaps unsurprisingly, a Christian. I was raised in a Christian home and, with the exception of a period of ephemeral teenage agnosticism, I have Read More ›