The “biological species concept” is yet another textbook dead zone. From ScienceDaily: Dr Addisu Mekonnen and colleagues at The University of Oslo, Norway, looked at the genetic diversity of the two populations of Bale monkeys. Analysis of mitochondrial DNA suggested strong genetic differences between the Bale monkeys who lived in continuous forests or fragmented forests. The researchers found that the populations of Bale monkeys were so different from each other that the Bale monkeys from fragmented forests were more similar to vervets and grivets than Bale monkeys from continuous forests. Dr Addisu Mekonnen, corresponding author of the study, explains: “Remarkably, our phylogenetic analysis showed that Bale monkeys in fragmented forests are more closely related to their sister species, vervets and Read More ›

Via Chad at Truth Bomb, quoting Christian philosopher J. P. Moreland, …you can’t get something from nothing…It’s as simple as that. If there were no God, then the history of the entire universe, up until the appearance of living creatures, would be a history of dead matter with no consciousness. You would not have any thoughts, beliefs, feelings, sensations, free actions, choices, or purposes. There would be simply one physical event after another physical event, behaving according to the laws of physics and chemistry…How then, do you get something totally different- conscious, living, thinking, feeling, believing creatures- from materials that don’t have that? That’s getting something from nothing! And that’s the main problem…However…if you begin with an infinite mind, then Read More ›

From ScienceDaily: Susanne Åkesson, a biologist at Lund University in Sweden, refutes the theory that zebras have striped fur to stay cool in the hot sun. That hypothesis is wrong, she and her colleagues show in a study recently published in Scientific Reports. There has been an ongoing discussion among researchers, dating back to Darwin, on why zebras have their signature black and white stripes. One of several theories is that it keeps them cool in the sunshine. The black stripes get warmer than the white areas, and the theory states that this creates small vortexes when the hotter air above the dark fur meets the cooler air above the white fur. According to the theory these vortexes works as Read More ›

According to the latest research, we learn from ScienceDaily: Earth’s oxygen levels rose and fell more than once hundreds of millions of years before the planetwide success of the Great Oxidation Event about 2.4 billion years ago, new research from the University of Washington shows. The evidence comes from a new study that indicates a second and much earlier “whiff” of oxygen in Earth’s distant past — in the atmosphere and on the surface of a large stretch of ocean — showing that the oxygenation of the Earth was a complex process of repeated trying and failing over a vast stretch of time. … Now, a team led by Koehler has confirmed a second such appearance of oxygen in Earth’s Read More ›

From physicist Jonathan Link (Director of the Center for Neutrino Physics) at Scientific American: To be fair, the Standard Model of particle physics is a remarkable scientific achievement; the crown jewel of the physics revolution that dominated the 20th century, but in the 21st century its apparent infallibility saps the vitality of the field. That’s why today nearly all of particle physics is focused on finding a crack, any crack, in its relentless edifice. For example, there are dozens of experiments trying to make a direct detection of particle dark matter, long known to cosmology but unknown to particle physics; there are searches for other particles beyond the Standard Model particle with names like axions and magnetic monopoles; a third Read More ›

Canada’s Globe and Mail recently published a horrifying exposé of China’s persecution of religious minorities. Large numbers – researchers estimate the total in the hundreds of thousands – of people have been placed in Chinese facilities known as re-education centres, where they are forcibly indoctrinated. The Globe described the “re-education” experience of one woman: The woman, whose name is not being used by The Globe and Mail for her protection, was put through regular self-criticism sessions.  Part of the content was cultural.  ‘My soul is infected with serious diseases,’ she would repeat.  ‘There is no God.  I don’t believe in God.  I believe in the Communist Party.’ Other content was more explicitly political.  Day after day she would say out Read More ›

From my (O’Leary for News) review of sociologist Steve Fuller’s book, Post-Truth: Knowledge as a Power Game: How ID Foxes Can Beat the Darwinian Lions Fuller clearly finds the foxes more interesting and sympathetic figures than the lions: “The lion rules by focused shows of force, as opposed to the fox’s diverse displays of cunning.” … The usual strategy of the Darwinian lions is to portray the ID foxes as not merely wrong but bad, for example as “liars” for not upholding the current orthodoxy. But, Fuller observes, that strategy can fail when the evidence does not really support the lions as much as they claim: “The dispassionate observer might well conclude that the lion’s extremely loud roar belies its Read More ›

A handy source on the broader view of naturalism (as a bit more elaborate than a dictionary and a tad more credible than Wikipedia) is Encyclopedia Britannica: >>Naturalism, in philosophy, a theory that relates scientific method to philosophy by affirming that all beings and events in the universe (whatever their inherent character may be) are natural. Consequently, all knowledge of the universe falls within the pale of scientific investigation. Although naturalism denies the existence of truly supernatural realities, it makes allowance for the supernatural, provided that knowledge of it can be had indirectly—that is, that natural objects be influenced by the so-called supernatural entities in a detectable way . . . . While naturalism has often been equated with materialism, Read More ›

Physicist Stephen Hawking warned humanity that “the development of artificial intelligence (AI) could spell the end of the human race… Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete, and would be superseded.” To meet the challenge of AI, Hawking urged the creation of “some form of world government.” But will AI really spell the doom of the human race? Is it truly capable of making humans obsolete? Or could it provide an opportunity for greater creativity and productivity based on a renewed understanding of human uniqueness? Join us in Seattle on Wednesday, July 11 for a fascinating evening exploring these questions as part of the launch of Discovery Institute’s new Walter Bradley Center for Natural and Artificial Intelligence, Read More ›

From ScienceDaily: Far from just being the product of our parents, University of Adelaide scientists have shown that widespread transfer of genes between species has radically changed the genomes of today’s mammals, and been an important driver of evolution. In the world’s largest study of so-called “jumping genes,” the researchers have traced two particular jumping genes across 759 species of plants, animals and fungi. These jumping genes are actually small pieces of DNA that can copy themselves throughout a genome and are known as transposable elements. They have found that cross-species transfers, even between plants and animals, have occurred frequently throughout evolution. Both of the transposable elements they traced — L1 and BovB — entered mammals as foreign DNA. This Read More ›

From The Case for Lucy as Ape: Part 5 of 6 by J. R. Miller at More than Cake: Lucy was the nickname for an incomplete Ethiopian skeleton found by the American paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson in 1974. Named for the 1967 Beatles song, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”. Despite being only 20% complete—missing hands, feed, knee and full pelvis bones—Lucy soon became the benchmark fossil for the species Australopithecus afarensis. Adding to the legend of Lucy, fossilized footprints were found two years later preserved in volcanic ash located in Laetoli more than 1,000 miles away and dated half-a-million years older. Despite this long geographic distance and timespan between fossil and footprint (not to mention the more obvious fact that Read More ›

From Peter Gooding at The Conversation: A recent study showed that it is possible to diminish people’s belief in free will by simply making them read a science article suggesting that everything is predetermined. This made the participants’ less willing to donate to charitable causes (compared to a control group). This was only observed in non-religious participants, however. … It may therefore be unsurprising that some studies have shown that people who believe in free will are more likely to have positive life outcomes – such as happiness, academic success and better work performance . However, the relationship between free will belief and life outcomes may be complex so this association is still debated. … People using a philosophical definition Read More ›

From Charles Q. Choi at Inside Science: When it comes to looking for alien life, scientists mostly focus on where there is water. Now researchers suggest that looking at “bioessential” elements such as phosphorus and molybdenum could help judge a world’s potential for life. But if we can’t find water, why should we consider these elements biosignatures? To see what roles such bioessential elements might play in the evolution of alien life, the researchers focused on how accessible they might be on worlds with liquid oceans underneath their frozen surfaces, much like Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s moon Enceladus. “People suspect there may be life in liquid water under the ice in Europa and Enceladus, and both NASA and ESA Read More ›

A little while ago, UD’s News noted on the tenth anniversary of Louisiana’s science education law, and an exchange has developed on the significance of “methodological” and “philosophical” “naturalism” in science, education — and by implication society. A crucial issue is the July 2000 statement of the US National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) on science education and how it must be confined to naturalistic concepts and explanations. For cause, I have long marked up that statement as follows: >>PREAMBLE: All those involved with science teaching and learning should have a common, accurate view of the nature of science. Science is characterized by the systematic gathering of information through various forms of direct and indirect observations and the testing of this Read More ›

From Geoffrey Pullum at Chronicle of Higher Education: Plenty of linguists have expertise in the analysis of sign languages, and none of them have ever independently confirmed Koko’s incipient linguistic competence. Koko never said anything: never made a definite truth claim, or expressed a specific opinion, or asked a clearly identifiable question. Producing occasional context-related signs, almost always in response to Patterson’s cues, after years of intensive reward-based training, is not language use. Not even if it involves gestures that a genuine signer could employ in language use. Neither journalists nor laypeople will ever be convinced of that. Such is their yearning to believe that Koko had mastered language, and had things to say, and shared those things with Penny Read More ›