Evolution

Here’s the transcript of the NPR interview with Vonnegut that I mentioned yesterday on this blog: Read More ›

Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA
by William A. Dembski and Michael Ruse (Editors)
Cambridge University Press, 2004

Review by Gal Kober on Jan 22nd 2006
http://mentalhelp.net/books/books.php?type=de&id=2982

The anatomy of man is a key to the anatomy of ape.” Karl Marx (Introd. to a Contrib. to a Critique of Polit. Economy, 1957)

Intelligent Design and the war waged by its proponents against evolutionary biology and the naturalistic practices of science are more a matter of public affairs than they are philosophical or scientific issues. Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA, a volume recently published by Cambridge University Press, aims at providing “a comprehensive and even-handed overview of the debate concerning biological origins,” and specifically, the more vocal aspects of this ‘debate’, namely, the conflict between evolutionary biology and supporters of intelligent design. Although it succeeds in doing that, it also has a seriously negative side. Read More ›

How much do most of us really know about the other mammals we have so much in common with? Or perhaps I should ask how little do most of us really know. Here’s a thought provoking article from naturalist Dr. Daphne Sheldrick who spent 30 years working with elephants in the wild and in captivity.

Elephant Emotion By Daphne Sheldrick Read More ›

Science and the Church: What it means to question Darwinism
by Herbert London

http://www.cruxproject.org/ScienceChurch.htm

Christoph Cardinal Schonborn, the Catholic archbishop of Vienna, recently
caused a firestorm in intellectual circles when he made the rather obvious
argument that Darwinism has many unexplained characteristics. The New York
Times responded reflexively by suggesting that the Church was turning away
from “modern science.” Read More ›

Michael Ruse has the unique distinction of contrbuting essays both to Phillip Johnson’s Festschrift (see here) and to that of Richard Dawkins — and both in 2006. The latest Oxford U Press catalog of new & recent titles in philosophy has the following entry: Richard Dawkins: How a Scientist Changed the Way We Think, edited by Alan Grafen and Mark Ridley. Essays by Daniel Dennett, Steven Pinker, Matt Ridley, James Watson, Simon Blackburn, Michael Ruse, Michael Shermer, and the Bishop of Oxford (!), among others.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4620922.stm

Lead researcher Dr Tania Singer said: “Men expressed more desire for revenge and seemed to feel satisfaction when unfair people were given what they perceived as deserved physical punishment.

“This type of behaviour has probably been crucial in the evolution of society as the majority of people in a group are motivated to punish those who cheat on the rest.

“This altruistic behaviour means that people tend to protect each other against being exploited by society’s free-loaders, and evolution has probably seeded this sense of justice and moral duty into our brains.”

Read More ›

In an unsurprising act of cowardice, not a single Darwimpian defender of the faith scientist had the balls fiber to stand up to our fearless leader in Kansas yesterday.
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My optimism that the “Vise Strategy” would eventually supersede the notorious “Wedge Strategy” is finally finding some justification (for the Vise Strategy, go here). It appears that the Vise Strategy is now beginning to get its proper due:

It’s possible for Christians to render unto God and unto Darwin
By David Hawpe

Sunday, January 22, 2006
The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Kentucky

My guess is that the recent forum on intelligent design at Broadway Baptist Church did not satisfy William Dembski’s preference for a “vise strategy,” in which the apostates who believe in evolution are hauled before tribunals to answer.

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Movement hopes to bridge the gap between evolution and creationism
By Steve Eighinger

Herald-Whig Staff Writer
January 21, 2006

More than 10,000 pastors nationwide have signed “The Clergy Letter” of support for Evolution Sunday Feb. 12, a day designed to bring attention to a movement that believes there is a way to bridge the gap between the theory of evolution and creation theology. Read More ›

This is a preview of a paper by John A. Davison that will be appearing in Rivista di Biologia and ISCID Brainstorms.

Do We Have an Evolutionary Theory?

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Steve Reuland over on Panda’s Thumb is babbling about whether some ID strawman du jour can be falsified. Let’s examine the real issue.
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http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v439/n7073/full/nature04168.html

Chinese scientists have found an interesting sample–a cretaceous symmetrodont therian with some monotreme like postcranial features–in the Liaoning fossil beds which they have named Akidolestes cifellii. Read More ›

http://www.metanexus.net/conference2005/pdf/staune.pdf

http://www.uctv.tv/library-human.asp?series=show&summary=show&seriesID=Focus_on_Origins&sort=

In Ron Kotulak’s article below, he interviews Carl Woese about the latter’s skepticism concerning the monophyly of life on Earth. “Woese next went after a big stumbling block in classical evolution,” writes Kotulak. “Darwin’s doctrine postulated that all living things eventually could be traced back to a single founding cell.” Woese says No — life could have started “millions of times,” and no single cell was ancestral to all organisms on Earth.

THE COSMIC CONVERSATION
How can lifeless particles evolve into living things? They basically
talk themselves into it, a group of scientists say.

By Ronald Kotulak
Chicago Tribune Read More ›