We’ve all heard the old saw about lies, damn lies and statistics.  It seems the aphorism holds when the statistics are charted.  Here is the only chart you will ever need when discussing global warming: See here for an explanation.

Well, there would have to be some, wouldn’t there? Otherwise, genomics would be hardly anything like it’s cracked up to be.* From the Atlantic: These genes might have contributed to the distinctive traits that make us human, but ironically, they are also very hard to study and often ignored. Many are missing from the reference human genome, which was supposedly “completed” in 2003. One such unique human gene is HYDIN2. It first appeared around 3.1 million years ago, as a duplicate of an existing gene called HYDIN. During the duplication process, “the head got chopped off and the tail got chopped off,” explains Max Dougherty from the University of Washington. It was as if someone had transcribed a book but neglected Read More ›

From New Scientist: It’s not the first time that people have claimed the discovery of potentially organic carbon in Hadean zircons – but the carbon in those earlier claims turned out to be an artefact of the preparation techniques used to study the zircons, says Harrison. “I think there will be little dispute regarding the primary nature of the inclusions,” he says. … Ultimately, carbon isotope data on its own is too ambiguous to decide whether Hadean carbon is evidence of Hadean life, says Thomas McCollom at the University of Colorado, Boulder. “I know a lot of people want to use such data as evidence of life, but this is governed more by what they want the outcome to be Read More ›

Here, with Berkeley biologist Michael Eisen, a co-founder of the Public Library of Science (PLOS): Yesterday the Gina Kolata published a story in the New York Times about the fact that many clinical studies are not published. This is a serious problem and it’s a good thing that it is being brought to light. But her article contains a weird section in which a researcher at the University of Florida explains why she hadn’t published the results of one of her studies: … “It was a small study and our hypothesis was not proven,” Dr. Cooper-DeHoff said. “That’s like three strikes against me for publication.” Her only option, she reasoned, would be to turn to an open-access journal that charges Read More ›

For two hours. Maybe they should all go to relationships counselling twice a week. Hat tip: Stephanie West Allen at Brains on Purpose

Bobby Conway, of One Minute Apologist, asks Jonathan McLatchie about the concept of irreducible complexity: Note: The term was not coined by Michael Behe, as often supposed or in creationist literature. Rather, here is where it originated: — Some say, of course, that the idea of irreducible complexity (IR) arose from creationist literature (also here.) Seriously, the term has so far been traced to Templets and the explanation of complex patterns (Cambridge U Press, 1986) by theoretical biologist Michael J. Katz. “Irreducible complexity” appears as an index entry in Katz’s book, and set forth as follows: In the natural world, there are many pattern-assembly systems for which there is no simple explanation. There are useful scientific explanations for these complex systems, but Read More ›

Professor Larry Moran’s latest post on Sandwalk criticizes Jonathan McLatchie for claiming that Intelligent Design is a legitimate scientific investigation. On the contrary, declares Moran, Intelligent Design is a movement whose members are motivated by a desire to discredit materialism and defend their belief in a Creator. 99% of ID activities, he claims, are attacks on evolution, rather than attempts to scientifically identify which objects were designed. Moran respects McLatchie for his solid grasp of evolutionary biology, but regards him as having “fallen in to the trap of deceiving himself about his true motives.” But even if Professor Moran’s characterization of the motives of ID proponents were entirely correct, it would be utterly irrelevant. The reason is that science is Read More ›

 We asked them, and we learned a lot, including: Common ancestry was at one time mainly a religious dispute. Everyone thinks they know what happened at the iconic Scopes “Monkey” Trial (they don’t, actually). But now, since genome mapping became routine, the unthinkable has happened: Actual genomes do not demonstrate the Tree of Life in the neat and orderly way that underlies Darwinian accounts of evolution. They could hardly be expected to do so, given the creativity many life forms exhibit with their own genes via natural genetic engineering, horizontal gene transfer, epigenetics, and a crowd of other mechanisms. The Tree of Life has become a bush or a circle of life. Finally, when we add up all the demonstrable Read More ›

From ScienceDaily: One of biology’s long-standing puzzles is how so many similar species can co-exist in nature. Do they really all fulfill a different role? Massive data on beetles now provide strong evidence for the idea that evolution can drive species into groups of look-a-likes that are functionally similar. What does it mean to say that “evolution can drive species into” … Isn’t evolution just the sum total of what happens? For whatever reason, the article doesn’t use the term convergent evolution, though that is clearly what it is discussing: While it is clear that species fulfill many different roles in ecosystems, it has also been suggested that numerous species might actually share the same function in a near neutral Read More ›

From Phys.org: Life on Earth likely started 4.1 billion years ago—much earlier than scientists thought UCLA geochemists have found evidence that life likely existed on Earth at least 4.1 billion years ago—300 million years earlier than previous research suggested. The discovery indicates that life may have begun shortly after the planet formed 4.54 billion years ago. “Twenty years ago, this would have been heretical; finding evidence of life 3.8 billion years ago was shocking,” said Mark Harrison, co-author of the research and a professor of geochemistry at UCLA. … “The early Earth certainly wasn’t a hellish, dry, boiling planet; we see absolutely no evidence for that,” Harrison said. “The planet was probably much more like it is today than previously Read More ›

With Bobby Conway. A friend has written me (O’Leary for News) to complain that the question is a dud. Friend, I sort of see what you mean. Putting it that way (is ID “science”?) reifies science in a way that distorts both the question and any possible answer. The question should be, Does ID provide accurate accounts of the origin and nature of life forms? Does it answer questions in a way that leads to greater knowledge and more avenues for exploration? If it does, but still isn’t considered “science,” well, so much the worse for science. Science is first and foremost a methodology for discovering accurate information about our world. It is not supposed to be a philosophy in Read More ›

From Aeon: Like IQ or EQ, there should be FQ: a freedom quotient to show how much free will we have – and how to get more It is often thought that science has shown that there is no such thing as free will. If all things are bound by the same impersonal cosmic laws, then (the story goes) our paths are no freer than those of rocks tumbling down a hill. But this is wrong. Science is giving us a very powerful and clear way to understand freedom of the will. We have just been looking for it in the wrong place. Instead of using an electron microscope or a brain-scanner, we should go to the zoo. There we Read More ›

As readers will gather, the religion news was a bit late on Sunday. Here we are dragging in with our last news item Monday morning, like the tomcat back from his travels. Well, it’s from Britain’s Daily Express: The colossal question has troubled religions, philosophers and scientists since the dawn of time but now a Canadian team believe they have solved the riddle. And the findings are so conclusive they even challenge the need for religion, or at least an omnipotent creator – the basis of all world religions. Whoa! An omnipotent creator is not the basis of all the world’s religions; alert! horseshoe in the works. Scientists have long known that miniscule particles, called virtual particles, come into existence Read More ›

LiveScience: The Origins of Religion: How Supernatural Beliefs Evolved … But not everyone agrees that religious thinking is just a byproduct of evolution — in other words, something that came about as a result of nonreligious, cognitive faculties. Some scientists see religion as more of an adaptation — a trait that stuck around because the people who possessed it were better able to survive and pass on their genes. Robin Dunbar is an evolutionary psychologist and anthropologist at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom whose work focuses mostly on the behavior of primates, including nonhuman primates like baboons. Dunbar thinks religion may have evolved as what he calls a “group-level adaptation.” More. The first thing that strikes a Read More ›

One minute apologist: What is the difference between ID and creationism? Bobby Conway interviews Jonathan McLatchie on the difference between ID and Creationism. Thoughts? Would it make a difference to design detection if there were no religious texts as at all? What if they had all disappeared in a barbarian onslaught (as much classical literature did during the Dark Ages)? Would we ask the same questions? Follow UD News at Twitter!