Carnival of Evolution, #2 : EvolutionBlog

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Jason Rosenhouse received his PhD in mathematics from Dartmouth College in 2000. He subsequently spent three years as a post-doc at Kansas State University. Observing the machinations of the Kansas Board of Education led to his unhealthy obsession with issues related to evolution and creationism. Currently he is an Associate Professor of Mathematics at James Madison University, in Harrisonburg, VA.

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Carnival of Evolution, #2

Category: Evolution
Posted on: September 15, 2008 8:06 PM, by Jason Rosenhouse

Update (9/16/08) : I forgot to include the link to the evolution carnival mothership! Please go here for more information.

Its carnival time! Thanks to everyone who sent me submissions for the big party. There were too many, alas, to respond to each one individually, but I appreciate the opportunity to sample so much good writing. How about we go sample the merchandise...

Aydin Orstan, who writes the blog Snail's Tales, gets pride of place. He serves up a fascinating post about, I kid you not, the reproductive organs of snails. Doesn't sound like your cup of tea? Give it a try anyway. Orstan provides yet another example fo the sort of convoluted, Rube Goldberg like structure that is easy to understand as the product of a long evolutionary history, but difficult to understand as the result of intelligent design.
Michon Scott provides a nice overview of some evolutionary basics. Not exactly a blog post, but close enough and well worth a read.
The Whited Sepulchre offers a humorous take on the extreme selectivity of creationists.
The Evolved Rationalist states it plain regarding the silliness of the “irreducible complexity” argument for Intelligent Design. ER's tone may not be to everyone's liking, but his argument is spot on.
Jason Brunet, who blogs over at jeffthefish tells the tale of engaging the beliefs of his creationist friends. I understand his feelings all too well. Ideally we all try to be respectful and understanding of the belifs of others, but at some point you just have to identify error for what it is. Jason does a nice job of skewering some common creationist claims.
Michael Zimmer of Its Alive!! serves up a hard-core post about the new video game Spore. I'm afraid much of this post was unrelated to anything I actually know anything about, but I serve it up here for your consideration nevertheless.
Tyson Koska of Truth is a Woman offers a nifty graphic for visualizing the spans of time involved in observing large-scale evolutionary change.
Michael Fridman provides a reminder of the stinginess of evolution. Some interesting examples to consider here.
Naon Tiotami, who blogs over at Homologous Legs, has an insightful post regarding creationist claims regarding micro vs. macroevolution.
Glen Davidson gives Michael Behe a proper reaming. Good stuff here. Glen writes the “Behe Fails Weblog” My kind of guy!
Phil for Humanity provides some brief thoughts on the usbject of what is, and is not, a theory. Be sure to check out some of his other links while you are there.
Hoxful Monsters provides a brief account of new findings regarding the loss of armor in stickleback fish. One more nice example of hos evolutionary thinking is useful in day-to-day biological research.
Karl Wilenauer offers some worthy thoughts on the subject of teaching creationism in science classes. His inspiration is the recent statement by British C of E clergymen Michael Reiss.
Finally, Richard Einhorn offers us something completely different. Information about his recently completed opera-oratoria “The Origin,” inspired by -- well, why not just take a wild guess.

So that's about it! Thanks again to everyone who sent me their posts.

The third installment of the carnival will be hosted by Greg Laden. You can find his blog here.

Find more posts in: Life Science

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Comments

I am a 'she', not a 'he'. However, thanks for including my post!

Posted by: Evolved Rationalist | September 15, 2008 11:24 PM

Thanks so much Jason!

Posted by: Jason Brunet | September 16, 2008 12:48 AM

This is a very good carnival, and the reason I like it is because it brings out the arguments that anyone familiar with talk.origins has seen over and over again. As with JefftheFish's post, I get frustrated that the same strawmen have to be exposed time and again as strawmen and not Icons.

I look forward to finishing the reading the rest of the Carnival.

Posted by: Mike Haubrich, FCD | September 16, 2008 6:26 AM

Thanks for this post...good variety (Snails to Spore) and very pertinent.

Posted by: Joe | September 16, 2008 11:35 AM

Evolved Rationalist -

Aaaargh! Sorry about that!

Everyone Else -

Glad you liked the carnival. Hopefully I can help send some readers to check out some very good writing.

Posted by: Jason Rosenhouse | September 16, 2008 5:07 PM

I wish someone (who, me?) had nominated John Wilkins' Darwin, God and chance from a little earlier this month. It's well worth reading, too.

Posted by: RBH | September 19, 2008 2:24 AM

I stumbled on your blog while researching the history of evolutionary study. Basically, I'm trying to find out what has been understood regarding evolution through history, specifically the 20th century.

I'm a philosophy major, and I have to write a paper on some of the writings of HJ McCloskey, specifically where he addresses the cosmological argument used by theists to base their belief in God. I'm curious what was widely held regarding evolution in the 1960's and whether there have been any significant changes. And I'm wishing I had paid better attention in my biology class...:-)

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Thanks!

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