News

Here. The first seven species classified by James Delingpole (Telegraph Online, 31 July 2011). One species he describes:

3. Stalker troll. It takes a fairly sick mentality to want to be a troll. If you were in any way healthy, you would prefer to hang out the blogs of people you agree with, rather than maliciously setting out to disrupt those of people you hate. Stalker troll is the sickest of the lot. He becomes obsessed with every last detail of life of the person whose blog he infests, in the hope of gleaning titbits which he can use against his nemesis. For example, one of the regular trolls on this blog makes frequent sneery references to the fact that Read More ›

From Victoria Gill (BBC, 22 July 2011), we learn: “Mandrill monkey makes ‘pedicuring’ tool”: Scientists from Durham University, UK, filmed the mandrill stripping a twig and using the resulting tool to clean under its toenails. “A crude “pedicure” carried out by a mandrill at Chester Zoo suggests the monkeys are capable of more advanced tool use than previously thought.” Vid. Good to know. But what about bird tool use? If (corvid) birds are better than monkeys, how should our views of evolution change?

Here. Alan R. Rogers tells us in The Evidence for Evolution

According to polling data, most Americans doubt that evolution is a real phenomenon. And it’s no wonder that so many are skeptical: many of today’s biology courses and textbooks dwell on the mechanisms of evolution—natural selection, genetic drift, and gene flow—but say little about the evidence that evolution happens at all. How do we know that species change? Has there really been enough time for evolution to operate?

That Rogers merely means an exploded Darwinism is evident from one of the endorsements: Read More ›

This is a serious science story, not like this one.

From MSNBC, we learn: “Breathe easier: Oxygen molecules found in deep space: For first time, after nearly 230-year search, they turn up in region of Orion nebula.” Which solves a mystery:

“Oxygen is the third-most-common element in the universe and its molecular form must be abundant in space,” said Bill Danchi, Herschel program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

So where is it? Read More ›

So says Ars Technica at Wired (August 1, 2011)

“Hawking used quantum theory to derive a result that was at odds with quantum theory,” as Nobel Laureate Gerard ‘t Hooft described the situation. Still, that wasn’t all bad; it created a paradox and “Paradoxes make physicists happy.”

“It was very hard to see what was wrong with what he was saying,” Susskind said, “and even harder to get Hawking to see what was wrong.” Read More ›

Here.

Atheist neuroscientist Raymond Tallis assails the cult of the neuron. A non-materialist psychiatrist comments, Read More ›

In Washington Post, along with (also ID-friendly) Palin:

Religion historian Marie Griffith has been watching this shift, and recently wrote an essay titled “The New Evangelical Feminism of Bachmann and Palin.” She caught all kinds of heat from feminists on the left who say that neither Bachmann nor Palin, whom some have dubbed “the spiritual heads” of the tea party, can remotely be regarded as their conceptual colleagues. Read More ›

Here. Polish subtitles. Embed disabled. Follow UD News at Twitter!

In “Earth Uniqueness Up; SETI Down” (Creation-Evolution Headlines, July 29, 2011), we learn:

Some astronomers are seriously considering that life might be rare or unique on our rare (or unique) planet. If so, hopes for finding sentient aliens on the celestial radio dial drop accordingly. The 50th anniversary of the first SETI search came, unfortunately for search enthusiasts, at a time when funding is harder to get.

New Scientist has been running a series called “Existence” for the purpose of examining big questions about the origin of the universe, life, and consciousness. Most of the articles try to give atheist answers to arguments of intelligent design.

Ah, someone noticed. Read More ›