“These issues also mean that life scientists cannot legitimately enlist the sound and well-evidenced explanations for microevolution and adaptation in support of macroevolution. “
Evolution
At Phys.org: How fluctuating oxygen levels may have accelerated animal evolution
“Oxygen levels in the Earth’s atmosphere are likely to have “fluctuated wildly” 1 billion years ago, creating conditions that could have accelerated the development of early animal life, according to new research. ”
At Sci News: Dogs Can Detect when Humans are Experiencing Stress
“Dog can smell the changes in our breath and sweat that occur when we’re stressed, according to new research by scientists from Newcastle University and Queen’s University Belfast.”
At Quanta Magazine: By Losing Genes, Life Often Evolved More Complexity
The unanswered question in the article is, “How did the genes develop in the first place?”
Templeton offers a review of the extended evolutionary synthesis
But, to the extent that Darwinism is all-sufficient, the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis, pioneered by Stephen Jay Gould and Niles Eldredge attempts to solve a problem that doesn’t — in theory — exist … But, if it DOES exist…
At Evolution News: Behe Debates the Limits of Darwinian Evolution
Connecting with an earlier post at UD, Michael Behe speaks to the limits of naturalism and when a “designing intelligence” is needed.
At Big Think: Can we predict evolution?
If the future forms of living organisms are predictable, it will be due to the ensemble of their systems of particles obeying fundamental laws of physics. “Evolution” is not a “law of physics” that is independent of or supersedes other known laws of physics.
Evolution Symposium 2023 June 21-25, 2023 in Albuquerque, NM, USA
If you think you have a topic for them, the organizers stress diversity but here’s what that means: ….. No, we didn’t notice anything about diverse viewpoints either. Must be a typo.
At Mind Matters News: Octopuses create an “origin of intelligence” conundrum
The evolution of intelligence in mammals and birds could be dismissed as a fluke. Finding far-distant intelligent life forms suggests a pattern instead. But what is it?
The Intelligent Design Audiopaper Project
I was thinking recently, about how many audiobooks are consumed by people these days. I would guess that the main reason behind this consumption is convenience. Many people just don’t have the time, or don’t create the time, to really sit down and get their head in a book. But I understand that for many, Read More…
At Mind Matters News: Pioneer environmentalist: Cyborgs will rule the planet
James Lovelock is very confident that the workings of evolution underpin his thesis but it is hard to see how. Lovelock is hard to classify. He has boundless faith in both Gaia and AI — in almost anything, it would seem, except humans.
Smithsonian Magazine: Why Did Europeans Evolve Into Becoming Lactose Tolerant?
Lactose tolerance: evidence of rapid evolution or intelligent design?
At Sci-News: Moths Produce Ultrasonic Defensive Sounds to Fend Off Bat Predators
Researchers: “These ultrasonic warning systems seem so useful for evading bats that they’ve evolved independently in moths on multiple separate occasions. In each case, moths transformed a different part of their bodies into finely tuned organic instruments.”
At Live Science: Scientists pinpoint the exact moment in evolutionary time when mammals became warm-blooded
“Scientists have pinpointed the moment in time our earliest ancestors evolved to be warm-blooded, and it happened much later and far more quickly than the researchers expected.”
At Mind Matters News: If octopuses are really smart, should we eat them?
At MMN: Octopuses present something of a puzzle. As Canadian investigative journalist Erin Anderssen pointed out earlier this month, “The octopus has already challenged our theories on evolution, intelligence and consciousness … invertebrates like octopuses were expected to be “naturally” less intelligent than, say, raccoons. But they are not less intelligent. They have been called a “second genesis” of intelligence and the jury’s still out on how they came to be so.”