Eyes Rolling

Quest to find life beyond Earth gets technological boosts By Andrea Pitzer, Special for USA TODAY 8/19/09 The search for intelligent life in the universe is still on. Despite the absence of interstellar tourists to date, astronomers at the SETI Institute (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) are hoping that we are not alone. And with new spacecraft to locate planets circling nearby stars, as well as more effective listening devices here at home, scientists have more tools at their disposal to find Earth-like planets or signs of other life forms. But the possibility of intelligent life is what interests scientists at SETI. Using SETI’s 42-antenna Allen Telescope Array in Northern California, they can listen in many directions for unusual radio signals Read More ›

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On May 26, 2009 Reverend Barry Lynn offered his characterization of infidels who refuse to venerate Darwinius. His tirade (supported by Eugenie Scott) can be found here: Show #1415 Eugenie Scott, Susan Russell.

Some excerpts:

Reverend Barry Lynn :
The more new evidence that develops the more some people dig in to their erroneous earlier beliefs
…..
I am still flabbergasted by the notion that no matter what you show some people and say…”this why I believe what I believe” some people say, “nope not enough”….

….the religious right is already saying….”it [Ida (Darwinius)] could be a fake”

What’s wrong with people that they can’t look at evidence and say, “Ok, I didn’t see it before I’m going to re-evaluate based on what I do see.”

Read More ›

Friday, 24 July 2009 01:05 ALEXANDER CHIEJINA With Agency Report Scientists have long suspected that the sex chromosome that only males carry is deteriorating and could disappear entirely within a few million years. However, until now, no one has understood the evolutionary processes that control this chromosome’s demise. Now, a pair of Penn State scientists has discovered that this sex chromosome, the Y chromosome, has evolved at a much more rapid pace than its partner chromosome, the X chromosome, which both males and females carry. Read more… Here is some relief: “Even though some of the genes appear to be important, the team thinks there is a chance that the Y chromosome eventually could disappear. If this happens, it won’t Read More ›

Well, that’s the story, here, and I also read it in a Toronto subway rag, going home in a vicious snow squall undoubtedly caused by global warming. Read More ›

Friday , March 06, 2009 By Andrea Thompson If Friday’s launch goes according to plan and successfully lobs NASA’s new Kepler space telescope into orbit, the mission stands to potentially change the way we look at the universe. Kepler is designed to turn its eye on thousands of stars in our own Milky Way galaxy and look for signs of Earth-sized planets orbiting in a region conducive to supporting life. Read more… I wonder if they have dumped the following idea… The Limits of Organic Life in Planetary Systems Executive Summary Reflecting the near inevitability of human missions to Mars and other locales in the solar system where life might exist, and given the interest of the public in the Read More ›

By Brandon Keim WiredMarch 09, 2009 Whether or not God exists, thinking about Him or Her doesn’t require divinely dedicated neurological wiring. Instead, religious thoughts run on brain systems used to figure out what other people are thinking and feeling. Read more…

A recent bill introduced into the Iowa State Legislature has prompted the defenders of Darwinian Dogma to issue the following statement:

STATEMENT BY IOWA FACULTY ON HF 183: THE EVOLUTION ACADEMIC FREEDOM ACT

We, the undersigned members of institutions of higher learning in Iowa, urge our legislators to reject passage of “The Evolution Academic Freedom Act” (HF 183) introduced by Rod Roberts (R-Carroll). The language of this bill comes primarily from the Seattle-based Discovery Institute, which has conducted lobbying efforts and political activism against the teaching of evolution since 1994.

Evolution is as established a scientific theory as any other theory in science. It is misleading to claim that there is any controversy or dissent within the vast majority of the scientific community regarding the scientific validity of evolutionary theory. Since there is no real dissent within the scientific community, then “academic freedom” for alternative theories is simply a mechanism to introduce religious or non-scientific doctrines into our science curriculum.

Similar efforts to undermine the teaching of evolution in schools repeatedly have been found to be unconstitutional, something witnessed most recently in Kitzmiller v. Dover (2005) in Pennsylvania.

We, therefore, urge our legislators to recognize HF183 as part of a long history of creationist assaults on science education, and reject passage of this bill.

Read More ›

The National Snow and Ice Data Center had to pull down its January and February arctic ice extent data because a deteriorating sensor on a satellite was slowly changing ice to water. By mid-February when someone noticed the readings were off by a half-million square kilometers. That’s a lot of ice when you consider that the all-time low (at least since 1980 when measurement started) in 2006 was down by less than 1.5 million square kilometers from the average. Read more at NSIDC: Satellite sensor errors cause data outage In other “global warming” news, the NSIDC reports that antarctic sea ice is at a record high (at least since 1980 when measurement started). The new high is REALLY high. It’s Read More ›

Originally written by uoflcard. I’d rather not distract from the main point of the other thread: HGT. So I created a separate thread for this topic, duplicating this info.

There is ‘Design’ in Nature, Biologist Argues

It is one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever read. A biologist says that the ID movement garners attention because it is appealing to believe there is design in nature. “To fight back, scientists need to reclaim the language of ‘design'”, he says. What the article and the biologist don’t explicitly say is basically they completely misuse the word “design”. Listen to his personal definition of design: Read More ›

From what I can determine, this is a true story:

A Mindful Hack reader writes,

The state of Maine gave a test to about 15,000 eighth-graders to assess their writing skills, including their ability to form a logical position. When the state refused to release the results, a newspaper filed a Freedom of Information Act request and learned that 78 percent of the kids failed, which was 50 percent more than failed the test the previous year. Maine’s Department of Education explained the results were “inconclusive”, and they discarded them because students reacted emotionally to the test. “Kids got ticked off at the [question],” explained Education Commissioner Susan Gendron, “so it was not an accurate reflection of their writing skills.” The essay-based test asked the students to support or refute the statement, “Television may have a negative impact on learning.” (Portland Press-Herald) …And their inability to form a logical position and refute that is proof that the test is flawed.”

At Bangor Daily News.com, Kent Ward asks:

Just what there is to get so upset about in the debatable proposition that television may have a negative impact on learning, I haven’t a clue. The more so when test instructions clearly gave students the choice of making a case either for or against the premise and provided the pros and cons for making their argument. Which is to say they weren’t exactly starting from scratch, with only a blank sheet of paper and a debilitating writer’s block for inspiration.

In any event, from Kelley Bouchard of the Portland Press Herald (September 7, 2008) we also learn:

Edwards noted that eighth-graders who took the writing test in 2007 were able to draw from their own experience to sustain arguments for or against the following statement: “Rather than maintaining separate teams for boys’ and girls’ sports, a high school is considering combining teams and having a completely coed sports program.”

Now that strikes me as a very emotional question for many students, yet the students could handle it.

Gendron could be right, that the results this year are a fluke. But here’s another possibility: Thinking about television induced in many students a state of mind not suited to critical thinking because that is in fact how they react to television. So they were not “ticked off” by the question, they were disabled by it. That’s hardly good news, even if it is a fluke.

Let’s see what next year brings.

Note: Poe’s law states that some people or situations just cannot be parodied because you couldn’t make up stuff that is further along the continuum.

Also just up at The Mindful Hack: Read More ›

David Deamer, a distinguished professor of zoology at UCSC, in an interview with Susan Mazur gives us his theory of information as it relates to genetics. Deamer: I think genetic information more or less came out of nowhere by chance assemblages of short polymers. Am I being unfair in interpreting the phrase “more or less came out of nowhere” as “poof”? I report. You decide.

Ever wonder what Science Bloggers do when they’re not science blogging? Wonder no longer. http://trends.google.com/websites?q=scienceblogs.com&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 Top Five Things Science Blog Readers Search For: 1. scotch tape mosquito bites 2. kate beckinsale 3. sponge bob 4. bruce lee 5. britney spears Interesting (if you’re a 12 year old). Top Five Blogs Science Blog Readers Also Visit 1. richarddawkins.net 2. catholicleague.org 3. rememberthycreator.com 4. dirtgetswet.com 5. politicalirony.com Yup. All science.

In case you missed it in the news or in SciAm: Mystery of the Montauk Monster is making the headlines.             Arthur Spiderwick’s Spitting Gargoyle               Man Bear Pig Chimera (art)           You decide.  🙂