Tag: evolution
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Bad at two things – intelligent designers on dark matter
It’s been a while since I felt it necessary to comment on the people who profess that things like “intelligent design” are science. However, tonight on Twitter the Discovery Institute mixed their usual nonsense – their fundamental distortion of biological science – with physics. Since they took it upon themselves to blend their area of […]
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Sanctimonium Santorum, once thought extinct, reappears
Many years ago, I commented on the seeming extinction of the species Sanctimonium Santorum [1]. Like many species that were previously believed to be extinct, there has been a sudden and unexpected reappearance of this odd species. However, as I commented then, In government, there are limited resources. There are only 100 Senate seats in […]
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From the Texas Freedom Network: 2011 Anti-science Quotes
Fresh from the Texas Freedom Network (TFN), here are their favorite anti-science quotes of the year: http://tfninsider.org/2011/12/26/2011-in-quotes-the-war-on-science/. By “favorite,” I of course mean the quotes that probably ensaddened the staff at TFN. TFN ” . . . is a nonpartisan, grassroots organization of more than 50,000 religious and community leaders. Based in Austin, the Texas […]
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It only makes sense in the light of Presidential aspirations
“Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.” [The title of the 1973 essay by the evolutionary biologist and Russian Orthodox Christian Theodosius Dobzhansky, who criticized the anti-evolution creationist movement.] Almost 30% of humans carry the Human Papillomavirus. In women, HPV has been linked to 90% of all cervical cancers. The HPV […]
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In the cathedral of Natural History
So the story goes, at least as Carl Zimmer recounts it, during a debate between Thomas Huxley (a staunch defender of Charles Darwin’s then new Theory of Evolution by means of Natural Selection) and Bishop of Oxford Samuel Wilberforce (a staunch opponent of the theory) in the Natural History Museum of Oxford University, Wilberforce asked […]
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Palin, Pawlenty, Science, Creationism
Something on the Sunday talk show, “Meet the Press”, caught my attention. Today’s show was hosted by Tom Brokaw, a favorite of mine in the news business. He interviewed Gov. Tom Pawlenty of Minnesota, Co-chair of the RNC convention in the Twin Cities. Gov. Pawlenty was acting as a “Vox VP” for the Republican VP […]
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Witless: A Critique of Coulter’s “Godless”
Last year, right-wing pundit and flapping head Ann Coulter published a book entitled “Godless”. In it, she raised yet again the tired accusations that all Democrats are godless politicians, hell-bent (is that the right phrase?) on creating a society that crushes religion out of every private life. Sigh. Of course, she takes the obligatory pot-shot […]
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Physics Today weighs in on the “Evolution Wars”
This month’s issue of Physics Today contains an article entitled “Evolution Wars Show No Sign of Abating”:http://www.physicstoday.org/vol-58/iss-8/p24.html. It’s free on the web, for all you non-subscribers (and I know there are just a few of you!). It’s a nice, but (as usual) scary, overview of this confusing mess into which the U.S. has gotten itself. […]